Shards of the Past
by K. C. Trexler
Summary: When the Master Emerald shatters, a watery creature escapes and begins wreaking havoc in the Station Square district of Emerald City. Sonic is sent down to the city to deal with the creature, but when he faces off against it, the true mastermind behind its release is revealed and a race for the Chaos Emeralds begins. SA1 adapt.
1. Chapter 1

All official characters are copyrights of SEGA and Archie Comics. Cody and Lily Griffor, Angel Starfire, Drake the chao, and Comet the chao are copyrighted to me.

**Author's Note**: This story takes place immediately following "Promises" and is an adaptation of Sonic Adventure 1. I know for a fact that this story is going to be a long one, so bear with me as I work on it. I can't keep to an actual release schedule for chapters, but I'm going to shoot for one a month if I can. So, hope you all enjoy this story and have fun reading it!

**Shards of the Past**

**Chapter 1**

The evening sun was beginning its slow decent in the west, bathing the usual azure skies in a golden hue. A lone black armadillo mobian watched the clouds float lazily by as he lay with his back resting against the ruins of an ancient shrine near the eastern edge of Floating Island, his mind wandering a bit as he lay in contentment. The armadillo finally looked back over his shoulders up to the top of the ruins where a massive green gem rested in the center of the shrine at the top of the stone stairs leading up to it, a lone crimson furred echidna standing right next to it, his hands resting on the gem with his eyes closed in concentration.

"You've been up there all day Knuckles. Are you sure you don't want to take a break for a little bit? I mean, you said we'd be there by night and it's pretty much that time," called Mighty to the echidna.

"I guess I can," said Knuckles, breaking from his concentration. He then looked up at the clouds, which had become more ominous looking in the last couple of hours. "Besides, I don't like moving the island through storms when I can avoid it. Too hard to concentrate with all the rain, wind, and lightning."

"I hear you on that," said Mighty, flipping on onto his feet. Here, he got a little nervous. He had remembered how angry Knuckles had been the day he had basically told Sonic and his friends to bite him, but he also knew from watching the echidna that he was somewhat regretful for doing so. "You know, it's been over close to four months since…you know…" Knuckles gaze shifted towards the armadillo.

"Yeah. I know," he said.

"Don't you think it's time to let that go and start anew with them?" asked Mighty. Knuckles gave a long sigh, closing his eyes and shaking his head.

"I don't know. I mean, it's true I owe Sonic a lot. He was the one that got the Master Emerald back from Eggman after all. But what he said to me that day…It's hard to let something like that go," said Knuckles.

"I know it is. But sometimes it's best to leave the past in the past and move on," said Mighty. Knuckles gave another soft sigh, looking back at the Master Emerald as it sat in the middle of the shrine ruins.

"I'll…think about it. But he'll have to be willing to apologize, and I mean sincerely apologize, before I'm willing to forgive him," said Knuckles.

"That's all one can ask for," said Mighty. He then flinched slightly as a fairly loud crack of thunder echoed through the area, signaling that the storm wasn't far off. "I think we should turn in for the night."

"You go ahead. I'll stay and keep an eye on the Master Emerald," said Knuckles.

"You remind me of one of the human postal people I remember hearing being talked about a while back. Through rain, sleet, sun, or snow, they do their job," said Mighty.

"Only my job's a lot more important," said Knuckles.

"True. Well, I'll be in the hut that's just down the path if you need anything," said Mighty before turning and walking down the path that led out of the ruins.

"Okay. See you in the morning then," said Knuckles as he walked to the top of the stairs. Sitting down on the top step, Knuckles lowered his head and closed his eyes, preparing to endure the weather as the first drops of rain started to fall.

* * *

Unbeknownst to the two mobians, a large airship had been following the island for the last hour, keeping itself hidden from view using the storm clouds as cover. The airship was bristling with laser cannons and missile launchers, befitting the design of its creator. At the command deck, a short man approached the captain of the vessel.

"Dr. Eggman, sensors indicate that the island has finally stopped moving," said Snively. The command chair situated at the helm of the ship turned to face Snively.

"Finally. Bad enough it took us two days to track down where the blasted island had been moved to, but the island moving made it impossible to begin our task," said Dr. Eggman, stroking his mustache with his left hand. "Is my hovercraft ready to depart?"

"Yes, sir," said Snively. "You'll be happy to know that our radar actually picked up the energy signal of the Master Emerald above ground." At this, the doctor grinned.

"Excellent. That knucklehead echidna's already done the hard part for us then," said Eggman. He then got out of the command chair and walked over to one of the many consoles that were strung about the deck. "Do we have a visual of it yet?"

"I dispatched a spy eye to the area the signal was coming from. It should be in range for a visual by now," said Snively. Eggman punched a few commands into the console and was rewarded as a video monitor lowered out of the ceiling in front of the command chair. The monitor then lit up, a picture showing the ruins of the shrine the Master Emerald was currently resting in, along with Knuckles sitting at the top of the ruins enduring the weather.

"He's guarding it, just as I thought he'd be," said Eggman. "Target the Master Emerald with one of our cannons."

"Sir, I'll ask you one last time. Are you sure you want to release this Chaos creature. You might not be able to control it," said Snively. Eggman turned back to him, clearly displeased with the comment.

"Of course I'm sure. I'll make that creature an offer it can't refuse. Now target it with a cannon this instant!" shouted Eggman, Snively almost jumping out of his skin before running over to one of the consoles. Eggman then turned back to the screen. "Besides, if this creature is really what nearly destroyed the echidna race over five thousand years ago, just imagine what it'll do to Knuckles once its set free. A little payback is never a bad thing."

"We're locked on sir," said Snively, looking up from the weapons console he was situated at.

"Fire," said Eggman, a grin spread ear to ear on his face.

* * *

_As far as storms go, this one isn't so bad,_ thought Knuckles to himself as he sat at the top of the shrine's stairs, his eyes closed as he tried to block out the rain and lightning from his mind. Sure, the full force of the storm's fury hadn't reached the island yet, but for now he was content to sit in meditation. Suddenly, a flash of light and the sound like that of a small explosion were seen and heard from just behind Knuckles, causing the echidna to break from his meditation by the sheer proximity of the sound of the blast. Turning his head back to look where the Master Emerald was at, he felt the blood rush out of his head at the sight that now greeted him. Where once the massive emerald had been resting, there was now only a crater of jagged shards remaining.

"What the heck!?" he cried, jumping to his feet. Out of the corner of his eye, he thought he saw a ball of pink light go racing away from the shrine, but paid it no other attention other than the passing glance. "How did this happen?!" As if on cue, Knuckles spotted what appeared to be a small puddle of water off to the side of the remains of the Master Emerald. But what caught his attention was that this puddle of water was staying together in a pool. Suddenly, the water began to rise, morphing into a humanoid shape with two jester-like dreadlocks coming off its head, solid green eyes, and what appeared to be a brain in the middle of its head. The ends of its arms then morphed into hands with three thick fingers.

"You did this, didn't you?" shouted Knuckles angrily, setting himself into an offensive stance to attack. The creature gave no outward sign that it had even heard Knuckles, making the echidna's anger even greater. "I don't know what you are, but you're gonna pay for breaking the Master Emerald!" With that statement, Knuckles charged the creature, swinging his right fist right at the creature. But before the blow could hit, the creature leaped high into the air, dodging the attack. Knuckles looked up to where the creature had jumped to, leaping into the air in pursuit. But before he could close the distance with the creature, it flung one of its arms out, the arm extending as it came towards Knuckles. Not expecting an attack like that, Knuckles didn't have time to put up a defense before the arm slammed into his body, throwing him back to the shrine stairs, sending him tumbling down them before falling in a heap at the bottom of the stairs.

"Hey Knuckles! What's going on?" hollered Mighty as he ran up next to Knuckles as the echidna started to rise back to his feet, the armadillo having been drawn out of the hut down the path by the sound of the explosion. Not even bothering to answer, Knuckles ran back up the stairs to see the creature waiting patiently at the top.

"Fight dirty with me, will ya?" snarled Knuckles, his voice resounding with anger. The creature didn't answer him, but instead started to dissolve back into a puddle of water. As soon as the creature was back into its puddle form, it seeped into the cracks of the stones that compromised the shrine and disappeared. "Hey! Where are you going!?"

"What the heck happened!?" asked Mighty as he reached the top of the shrine, taking in the sight of the small crater of gemstone that remained of the Master Emerald.

"Some creature broke the Master Emerald," said Knuckles, kneeling down and slamming a fist into the stone floor of the shrine, several new cracks jutting out from where his fist had collided. Suddenly, the whole land shook violently, knocking both mobians to the ground.

"What's going on!?" cried Mighty.

"The island's starting to fall!" answered Knuckles. He closed his eyes as he tried to feel out the presence of any pieces of the Master Emerald. It took a couple of seconds, but he suddenly recognized the chaos aura of the Master Emerald all around the shrine. "I can sense there are several shards still around the shrine! Help me find them quick! We've only got a couple minutes before the island falls to the mainland below and if we hit land the island will be destroyed! I have to get the island back out over water before we hit!"

"Don't have to tell me twice," said Mighty as he ran back down the stairs, Knuckles close behind him. The two began scouring the ground around the shrine, both finding shards of the giant gem strewn across the ground.

"That'll have to do. We can't waste any more time looking," said Knuckles after about a minute of looking, running up the shrine's stairs with several chunks of emerald in tow. Mighty grabbed the last shard he saw before heading back up the shrine stairs behind Knuckles. At the top of the shrine, Knuckles flung the shards in his hands into the air and closed his eyes in concentration, the gems stopping to hover over the remains of the Master Emerald. The shards then started to converge with the remains, building upon the remains as Knuckles willed the Master Emerald to repair itself. Mighty then threw his shards over the remains, the same thing happening. By the time the shards had finished, nearly a quarter of the Master Emerald had been restored. Knuckles opened his eyes and looked over what had been restored. "Oh man, I hope this is enough."

Knuckles then placed both hands on the Master Emerald, closing his eyes in concentration again as he tried to will the island to start moving out over the ocean. At first, he couldn't sense the island moving horizontally._ Please move, _he thought to himself as he concentrated harder. The island suddenly shuddered a little, signaling to Knuckles that the island had started moving towards the ocean. _This is gonna be way too close._ Nearly a minute ticked by before the island suddenly lurched hard, throwing the two mobians to the ground for the second time in just a few minutes.

"Did we hit the ground or the ocean?" asked Mighty, alarm clearly in his voice. Knuckles smiled as he got back to his feet.

"Well, the island's not falling apart, so my guess is we hit the ocean," he answered. This news caused Mighty to breathe a big sigh of relief.

"So…What now?" asked Mighty. Knuckles sighed, his smile vanishing in an instant. He then closed his eyes as he tried to feel out any traces of the remaining pieces of the Master Emerald. After a nearly half a minute, he opened his eyes back up.

"Well, the good news is that most of the Master Emerald seems to be still on the island, albeit scattered all over the place," said Knuckles.

"And the bad news?" asked Mighty, arching an eyebrow.

"Bad news is that some of the pieces are several miles up the coast of the shore we landed next to. I can't tell how much of it is that way, just that a significant amount of the Master Emerald's chaos aura is radiating to the north about twenty miles or so," said Knuckles.

"I'll bet when the emerald was shattered, those chunks flew off the island while it was still airborne," said Mighty.

"You're probably right," said Knuckles. "Well, first thing's first. I'll start scouring the island for what shards I can find."

"You don't want me to help you?" asked Mighty.

"I need you to watch over what's left of the Master Emerald incase that creature comes back to finish the job," said Knuckles.

"I can do at least that much to help out," said Mighty.

"Well, be ready for extended guard duty cause till I find all the pieces of the Master Emerald, I'm not gonna be able to devote any time to guarding what's left of it," said Knuckles.

"Not a problem," said Mighty, giving a smile.

"Thanks. I'll feel better knowing that you're watching the shrine till I get back," said Knuckles.

"You gonna head out right now to look for the shards?" asked Mighty.

"No time like the present," answered Knuckles as he started walking down the stairs leading up to the top of the shrine.

"You are a postal worker, you know that?" teased Mighty.

"Stop calling me that," said Knuckles.

* * *

"Well, too bad Chaos didn't stick around to really give Knuckles a good working over, but I'll still take him knocking that foolish echidna down a peg," said Eggman, finally turning away from the monitor that was displaying what his spy eye was sending back to the Egg Carrier's command deck. He looked over at Snively, who was watching one of the other monitors. "Did you get a lock onto Chaos' bio-signature?"

"I believe so, sir," said Snively, looking up from his monitor. "He's left the island and is headed inland."

"Good. Patch the data into my hovercraft," said Eggman before walking towards the turbo lift at the back of the deck. "Time to go and meet our new comrade in arms."

* * *

Near the edge of the coastline that the Floating Island had landed next to, a vast jungle stretched for miles in all directions. Small clearings dotted the landscape and small paths where explorers had made trails were visible from the air. About a quarter mile into the jungle from the coast, a single hut sat in one of the clearings. While nothing to really look at, it housed the only mobian that called the jungle home. A rustle of underbrush at the edge of the clearing caused the few small animals that had been in the clearing to scatter as a large, purple mobian cat exited the foliage, fishing pole and tackle box in one hand, an impressively large fish in the other. As he walked out into the clearing, a rather large frog exited the underbrush and faithfully hopped after the cat.

"I tell you Froggy, I think my lucky charm is getting even luckier," said the cat as he walked up next to the hut. "I haven't caught a fish this big in months. And during a storm no less." The cat sat the fishing pole and tackle box on the ground, then hung the fish by its tail on a good sized hook that was tangling off the roof of the hut. The frog, in the meantime, had wandered over to a puddle of water that had appeared in the clearing and was drinking out of it. But after only its first gulp of the water, the frog leaped back away from the puddle as if taking the drink had hurt it. It then started to quiver almost violently. Suddenly, the puddle started moving across the ground, quickly making an exit from the clearing. By now, the cat had finished his attentions with the fish and he was now rummaging through his tackle box for something. Finding what it was he was looking for, he stood back up and turned around to face the frog. In his hand was none other than the yellow Chaos Emerald.

"You okay Froggy?" asked the cat, noticing that the frog was acting strangely. Suddenly, a small protrusion appeared on the back end of the frog. Then it quickly extended out from the frog before stopping after growing about four inches long. "Hey! How'd you grow a tail little buddy?" The frog then turned to look at the cat, eyeing the gem in his hand. "What's wrong?" Without warning, the frog suddenly started hopping as fast as it could towards the cat, leaping up into the air as it snagged the Chaos Emerald from the cat's hand, swallowing it in a single gulp as it hit the ground. "Hey! Why'd you eat my charm!?" Without a second thought, the frog then started hopping away into the underbrush as fast as it could. "Come back Froggy!" shouted the cat, grabbing his fishing pole before he started to chase after the frog.

* * *

"This blasted overgrown jungle is making it hard to track this thing," said Eggman to himself as he flew in his hovercraft just a few yards above the tree line of the thick jungle, watching his onboard instruments carefully. He had been tracking the creature's bio-signature as best he could for the last ten minutes, but the dense foliage below was making it difficult to get a solid lock on its signature. As he flew over a rather large clearing, his scanners finally picked up the bio-signature he had been following. Looking over the side of his hovercraft, he spotted a puddle of water moving swiftly across the clearing. "Gotch'ya." Throwing the hovercraft into a dive, he swooped down right in front of the moving puddle of water, causing it to halt. He then gently lowered the craft to the ground before climbing out. The puddle suddenly started to morph, growing upright until it turned into the creature that had attacked Knuckles back on the Floating Island. The creature then prepared itself to strike.

"Now hold on Chaos," said Eggman, throwing both arms up in a defensive gesture. "I just wanted to discuss a business proposition with you." The creature cocked its head at hearing this, but otherwise remained in its stance. Eggman, now more confident after not being attacked right away, lowered his hands and clasped them behind his back. "I happen to know that you are a creature that seeks destruction and mayhem. I also know that you need the seven Chaos Emeralds to acquire your true, perfect form. I can help you get them." At hearing this, the creature relaxed its stance.

"I know for a fact that six of the seven emeralds are in the near vicinity, separated only by about thirty miles give or take. I also know where the seventh one is at, though getting that one will require a little bit of strategy," said Eggman. "I have just one condition for helping you gather them and that is that you work for me." Eggman waited a few seconds to let his offer sink in before asking the next crucial question. "So, do we have a deal Chaos?" The creature remained frozen for a few seconds, then slowly nodded its head a few times, signaling to Eggman that he was willing to agree to those terms. "Excellent. We'll start immediately tonight by sending you to attack the Station Square district of Emerald City, which is only about twenty miles to the north. With any luck that will flush out the only Chaos Emerald that's not in the area. Once we get that one, we can focus our attention on the other six."

Eggman then turned and climbed back into his hovercraft before taking off and coming to a hover over the creature with it. He then activated a tractor beam that struck the creature, pulling it up into a storage compartment that was attached to the bottom of the hovercraft. The hovercraft then took off like a shot, heading for the city to the north as Eggman's laughter echoed through the air.

* * *

_It's been quiet…too quiet lately_, thought Sonic as he lay on his back on the roof of his hut in Knothole village, sighing as he closed his eyes. It had been only a week since Eggman had abandoned Robotropolis, an act done after Metal Sonic had gone rogue and sabotaged all of Eggman's bases in the north, yet with the peace came a sense of boredom for the spiky blue hedgehog. He wasn't used to things being peaceful. He had only known that in the one year he had lived with the hedgehog he called uncle, Sir Charles Hedgehog, in their little repair shop in Mobotropolis before Eggman had come and took it all away. He frowned as he thought back to that year of his life, wishing he could remember something before meeting his uncle out at the edge of the Great Forest all those years ago. He didn't even remember how he had gotten there or who his parents were. Not a single thing before that day was in his memories.

"Hey Sonic!" called a familiar voice from down below him.

"Yeah Sal?" asked Sonic, not even opening his eyes as his train of thought was broken.

"Just got a call from the mayor of Emerald City. Says he wants to talk to you," said Sally.

"What for?" asked Sonic.

"Not sure. All he said was it was something he wanted to discuss with you," said Sally. Sonic gave a groan before sitting up, looking down at the female ground squirrel as she stood a few feet away from his hut.

"Isn't diplomatic stuff your department?" asked Sonic, trying to get out of the situation. While he liked most of the humans he had met during his travels to the southern continent, the leaders of the cities were a different matter. They all seemed stuck up and stubborn to talk to, or at least that had been his experience the few times he had listened in on one of Sally's conversations with said leaders.

"I've tried to resolve it myself, but he won't share anything of detail with me," said Sally.

"Fine," said Sonic, annoyance laced in his voice. He stood up and jumped down off the roof of his hut, landing next to Sally. The two of them started making their way back to Sally's hut. The village was bustling with mobians and robians carrying tools, wood, and other building supplies as they continued their work on the enormous housing project that was now underway to build the robians a place to stay. Already over forty robians' minds had been freed by Nicole using the program given to them by Metal Sonic. Still, they had a long way to go to free the over six hundred robians that remained.

Even though a way to de-roboticize the robians hadn't been discovered yet, the ones whose minds had been freed had come to terms with their situations rather well, taking it all in stride. As they came up to Sally's hut, Sally stopped and turned to Sonic at the entrance to the hut.

"I know how much you hate dealing with the human leaders, so just get the details and I'll jump in wherever I can to speak for us," said Sally.

"Thanks. No offense to the humans, but they have lousy leaders in my opinion," said Sonic.

"I tend to agree with that statement," said Sally as the two walked into her hut. As they went into her bedroom, Sonic was immediately greeted with a holographic image of a man in his mid-forties with slightly graying brown hair being displayed by a disc similar to the one that they had given to Angel Starfire before she had departed nearly four months ago.

"Hey Mr…uh…" started Sonic, suddenly realizing he hadn't the foggiest idea what the man's name was.

"Pepper. Richard Pepper," said the image, giving a smile. "And I'm guessing your Mr. Hedgehog."

"Call me Sonic please," said Sonic, already annoyed that he had been called by his last name.

"Sonic, then. I was wondering if you could do Emerald City a favor," said Mr. Pepper.

"Give me one good reason why I should help your city. When we asked you for help, on multiple occasions as I recall, you refused us," said Sonic. The man gave a nervous smile.

"You must understand that I was only looking out for the people of this city. If we had aided your cause in any way, that was basically us raising a flag for Dr. Eggman to come and attack us," said Mr. Pepper.

"Okay…I'll give you that one," said Sonic.

"If I may," said Sally, interrupting the conversation. "Dr. Eggman has been neutralized on our continent."

"Has he now?" asked Mr. Pepper, raising an eyebrow in disbelief.

"He has. Since there is no way for him to find out that your sending aid to us anymore, I propose this. Sonic will come down there and help with whatever problem you have, and in exchange…" started Sally.

"Whoa, time-out there Sal," said Sonic, throwing up his hands in a "T" shape. "I ain't agreeing to anything till I know what I'm getting myself into." Sally gave him a sheepish grin, realizing she had overstepped her bounds. She then turned back to the image of Mr. Pepper.

"Yes. Tell us what this problem is first," said Sally.

"Very well," said Mr. Pepper. "For the last three nights, a section of our city called Station Square has come under attack by some kind of…creature."

"What kind of creature?" asked Sonic. Mr. Pepper just closed his eyes and shook his head.

"We're not sure. Eye witnesses say the thing is humanoid in shape and is made of water, but every time our police forces get within a block of where the creature is destroying things, it vanishes without a trace. Quite frankly, we don't know what to do to stop it," said Mr. Pepper.

"And that's where I come in," said Sonic, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Exactly. If you live up to your reputation, this should be a simple matter for you to deal with," said Mr. Pepper.

"Let me talk it over with Sally first," said Sonic, grabbing a surprised Sally's arm and walking her into the next room, out of earshot of the holoprojector. "What do you think?"

"We're already running short on supplies for building the robians their new homes. If you deal with whatever this creature is, I can get him to send us the supplies we need," said Sally. Sonic nodded.

"Sounds good to me. But I want to take Tails with me," said Sonic. Sally frowned at this request.

"Why take him with you?" she asked.

"Sal, the kid's been cooped up here in Knothole for nearly his whole life. I want to get him out, show him other places besides here, met new people. Only other place aside from Robotropolis he's been to in the last two years is Floating Island. Plus, he's never met another human besides Eggman. It'll be good for him to meet some nice humans for a change," said Sonic. Sally sighed, then gave him a stern look.

"Fine. But I'm trusting you to keep him out of trouble," said Sally. Sonic gave a smile at this.

"I can do that much," said Sonic. "So we good then?"

"Yeah. Think so," said Sally. Sonic motioned to her bedroom door.

"Shall we?" asked Sonic, Sally giving a nod as the two turned and walked back into the bedroom and up to the holo of Mr. Pepper. "I'll go, but Sal's got some conditions for this little visit."

"We'll be happy to help however we can if you're willing to come help us," said Mr. Pepper.

"Okay. We have a nice list of supplies that we could use…" said Sally.

* * *

"Hey Tails! You in here?" hollered Sonic as he walked up next to the shed that housed the Tornado. Already he noticed that the plane looked different than it was last time he had seen it. Gone was the red paint job and white wings that it had once sported. Now in its place, the entire plane had been painted the same color blue as Sonic was with an orange trim on the wings and a line of orange going down the middle of both sides of the plane's fuselage with a little orange, double tail symbol near the back fin on both sides. He also noticed that it now sported a swivel-mounted laser cannon under the fuselage.

"In the back!" called out Tails' voice.

"Like what you did to the plane," said Sonic as he walked around it towards the back of the shop. Seated at the workbench was Tails, a small, cone shaped object sitting on the workbench in front of him. Various tools were strewn about the bench. "Working on something new?"

"Yeah. I'm not quite done with it yet, though," said Tails as he fiddled with the screwdriver, adjusting something on the device.

"Well, pack it up because you and I are headed south," said Sonic. Tails looked over his shoulder at Sonic, finally taking his eyes off his new toy.

"Really? Where to?" he asked.

"Emerald City," said Sonic.

"A human city? Why there?" asked Tails, his interest finally caught.

"They have a problem they need help with, so I'm gonna go down there and fix it for them. I'm taking you along because it'll be good for you to get out of this village after all this time," said Sonic.

"Alright. But I'm taking this with me. I haven't worked on it for the last two weeks straight to stop now," said Tails, turning back and picking up the object. He then walked over to the Tornado and climbed up on its wing, dropping the device in the pilot's chair.

"So, headed for Emerald City I hear," said a voice from behind the pair. Both turned to see a robian hedgehog standing at the entrance to the shed, a pair of chao hovering near both his shoulders. The one on the left was a deep crimson in color, with three small horns sticking out of his head with a bigger pair of yellow striped brown horns coming out of the top of his forehead, a pair of green antenna that drooped down in front of his eyes, and a pair of reptilian wings topping off his look. The one of the right was a rich violet in color with two, jester-like dreadlocks coming off the back of her head. She had red-tipped, golden feathers for bangs and a pair of wings with the same feathers whose wingspan was easily twice the height of her body.

"You heard right Cody. We are," said Sonic.

"Then I have a favor to ask you then," said Cody, jerking a thumb at both the chao. "Take these two with you." Sonic frowned at the request.

"Why take them?" he asked.

"I'd like you to take them to the Chao Garden in the Emerald's Glow hotel," said Cody.

"Chao Garden?" asked Comet, the violet chao, looking over at Cody curiously.

"Yeah. I think that's where I came from," said Drake, the crimson chao, looking over at Comet.

"It is," said Cody. "And I think it would be good for both of you to be around other chao besides yourselves for a change."

"That sounds nice," said Comet. "I haven't seen another chao other than Drake in the last ten years."

"At least you've seen other ones. You're the only one I've ever seen," said Drake.

"This is exactly why I want you two to go with Sonic and Tails. It'll be good for you to make some new friends," said Cody.

"I think that'll be fine if you two want to come," said Sonic, looking at the two chao.

"I'm game," said Drake.

"So am I," said Comet.

"Then it's settled," said Cody, clasping his hands together. "Have a safe and fun trip you guys."

"Don't know if it'll be fun, but it'll at least take some of the boredom I've been feeling away for a few days," said Sonic.

"Already missing all the action are you?" asked Cody, giving Sonic a smirk.

"I guess so. I just don't like sitting still, that's all," said Sonic. He closed his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest. "This last week has been a total bore. This thing I'm going down south to take care of will be a nice distraction."

"With Eggman gone, this might be the last 'distraction' you get for a while," said Cody.

"Yeah…Still, I doubt we've heard the last of Eggman. Mecha might have crippled his powerbase in the north, but I'll bet my sneakers he'll return someday," said Sonic.

"You think?" asked Tails, a nervous look etching its way onto his face.

"Probably. And if he does, I'll do my best to stop him," said Sonic, giving a small grin at the thought.

"Well, for our sakes I hope he doesn't come back. He's already caused enough damage," said Cody, lowering his head to look at the ground.

"Only time will tell," said Sonic. He then turned to look back at Tails. "So, ready to head out?"

"Yeah. You gonna ride on top like you always do?" asked Tails.

"Wouldn't ride it any other way," said Sonic.

"Well, you might have to at some point in the future," said Tails.

"Why's that?" asked Sonic. Tails gave a big grin at the question.

"That would be giving away the surprise now, wouldn't it?" teased Tails. At hearing this, Sonic just returned the smile.

"I can only imagine what you've cooked up in that head of yours little bro," said Sonic.

"Well, truth is I'm not done modifying the Tornado. I still have a little bit of work to do on it before its totally finished, but I figure I can work on it while we're down south," said Tails.

"Not gonna go into the city with me?" asked Sonic. Tails just shook his head.

"Not till I get the Tornado's modifications finished," said Tails.

"Alright. Just don't spend every waking moment working on it. I know how you get sometimes. I want you to talk to the people there, make some new friends if possible," said Sonic.

"I can do that," said Tails.

"I think this little venture out into the humans' neck of the woods will do you good Tails," said Cody. He then walked up next to the two tailed fox and lowered his head down next to his ear. "Just make sure to keep Sonic out of trouble." Tails just smiled at this.

"I'll try," said Tails. Sonic just shook his head and smiled at hearing Tails response. Cody turned back to the two chao as they hovered near the entrance to the shed.

"And Drake, try to behave," said Cody. Drake's face turned sour at hearing the request. He then pointed at Comet with one of his clawed fingers.

"What about her?" asked the dragon chao.

"I know she'll be good, it's you I'm worried will cause a problem," said Cody.

"When have I ever been a problem?" asked Drake. Cody just smirked at the dragon chao's question.

"Let's see. You want me to go through this week's or last week's list of times you caused a problem for the other villagers?" asked Cody.

"Face it Drake, he's got your number," said Sonic, also remembering the last couple of pranks Drake had tried to pull off, only to have them backfire in grand fashion. Drake's face turned crestfallen.

"Fine. I'll behave," said Drake.

"Good. I'll hold you to that. Sonic will let me know if you don't keep your word," said Cody.

"Oh I'll be sure to share every detail if he acts up, don't you worry," said Sonic.

"Well, I've kept you guys long enough. Happy trails and have a good time," said Cody as he gave a small wave as he walked out of the shed and started down the path leading back to the main area of the village.

"Shall we?" asked Sonic, looking back at Tails.

"Lets," said Tails as he hopped up onto one of the wings and then climbed into the cockpit.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

Tom Munson, a man in his mid-twenties with dark brown hair, sat at his usual chair situated in front of his usual radar console at the top of the control tower for the small airport that was roughly fifteen miles south of Emerald City. The small airport was situated on top of a small mesa overlooking part of the jungle that had been cleared away to set up the bullet train that ran between the airport and the Central Station of the Station Square district of Emerald City. The airport was really only suitable to accommodate smaller planes, usually prop planes and maybe the occasional small jet engine plane that brought small groups of tourists or businessmen every day. As Tom took a drink from his first cup of coffee for the morning, a blip suddenly appeared on the radar screen. Setting down his coffee cup, he flipped on his radio microphone.

"Unidentified aircraft, this is the Mystic Ruins Airport. We have you on radar. Please identify yourself," said Tom into the mike A few seconds ticked by before a somewhat garbled child's voice answered back.

"Mystic Ruins Airport, this is the Tornado, requesting clearance to land," said voice. The obviously young age of the voice threw Tom off-guard, not expecting such a young person to have answered him.

"Copy that Tornado, uh…Who am I speaking to?" asked Tom.

"Tails," answered the voice over the radio.

"Well, Tails. The runway is clear and waiting for you to land. See you in a few," said Tom.

"Thanks. We'll be there in a couple of minutes," said Tails. As Tom cut the radio transmission, he got up from him chair and walked towards the stairwell leading down the control tower as he left to go meet the new arrivals as he always did.

The late summer breeze blew through Sonic's quills as he rode atop the wings of the Tornado, he eyes scanning the ground below for the airport that Tails had said they should be coming upon any moment. He was glad for the distraction of looking for the airport seeing as how he had spent most of the trip lost in his own thoughts, his mind wandering back to the year of peace before the coup like it had ever since they had left their campsite that morning. Tails had insisted he could fly them the whole way that night, but Sonic had counter insisted that they stop for the night about four fifths of the way through the trip, saying he didn't want Tails to fall asleep at the wheel. Tails had reluctantly agreed, though he wasn't happy about it.

"Hey Sonic! I think I see it!" shouted Tails over the noise of the wind, breaking Sonic from his daydream, the blue hedgehog realizing he had let his mind wander despite supposedly looking for the airport. He silently cursed at himself, annoyed that he had let that happen again. Looking down to the south, he spotted the mesa where the Mystic Ruins Airport was situated on.

"Good eye!" shouted Sonic. A smile crept onto his face as an idea came to mind. "Hey Tails! Fly right over the landing strip before you turn it around to land!"

"Why?" asked Comet from her spot in the back seat next to Drake, not sure why Sonic would make such a request.

"I'm gonna show them something they don't see every day," said Sonic. Tails only smiled to himself, wondering what stunt Sonic was about to pull.

"Alright, get ready to do whatever you're gonna do then," said Tails as he pointed the plane towards the airstrip. Sonic squinted as they got close enough to make out details on the mesa, spotting two humans standing at the beginning of the airstrip. Smiling to himself, he crouched down on the wing. As the Tornado passed by the airstrip, Sonic suddenly leapt off the wing, going into a free fall towards the hard rock and concrete below him. He glanced over at the humans gathered at the edge of the airstrip, one of which was pointing at him and looking around in panic. About halfway through the fall, Sonic curled into a spindash, accelerating his fall even more now that his wind resistance was a lot less. About fifty feet before he hit the ground, he uncurled and got into an upright position. Finally, he landed on both feet in a knelt position, his face looking down at the ground. By now, the two humans were running over to see if he was alright. As they got up beside Sonic, they both stopped after realizing that he was perfectly unharmed.

"That was a perfect ten, don't you think?" asked Sonic, looking up at the two humans with a smile plastered on his face. A man dressed in a white muscle shirt and black shorts shot an angry glare at the cerulean hedgehog.

"That wasn't funny, mobian! I thought you fell out of the plane on accident!" he shouted. At this, Sonic's smile turned sour.

"Hey now Mike, don't be mad at him. He probably does this kind of thing all the time," said Tom. The man scoffed, then turned and started walking towards the single large hanger that was on the mesa. Tom turned back towards Sonic. "I apologize for Mike. He's never wanted to believe that you mobians can do the kinds of things you can do."

"Yeah. Humans are good at underestimating us," said Sonic. The sound of tires screeching drew both their attention as the Tornado touched down on the end of the runway, the plane slowing down as it approached them. As it finally came to a stop about twenty yards behind them, they started walking towards it as Tails climbed out onto the lower left wing. The two chao flew out of the passenger seat, coming to a hover on either side of Tails' shoulders.

"Have fun doing that?" asked Tails.

"As always, even if I got dissed for doing it," said Sonic.

"And this must be the young mobian I talked to over the radio. Tails, right? I'm Tom," said Tom, reaching a hand up towards the young fox.

"Nice to meet you, sir," said Tails, shaking Tom's hand.

"How old are you anyways? I can tell just by your voice that you haven't reached your teens yet," said Tom.

"I'll turn eleven in about two months," said Tails.

"Really? Well, you are a gifted kid to be able to fly a plane like you've been doing it for years," said Tom.

"You think him being able to fly a plane is something, you should see all the crazy stuff he builds in his spare time. The kid's a mechanical and technical wiz," said Sonic. Tails blushed at the comment.

"I wouldn't go that far," said Tails. "But that does remind me. Is there any place I can work on the Tornado where I won't be in people's way?"

"Yeah. We might only have one hanger, but she's got a lot of open space. Why don't you bring it on in and I'll set you up a nice work area."

"Thanks," said Tails as he hopped back into the pilot's seat. As he fired up the Tornado's engine again, Sonic turned back to Tom.

"Hey. Is there any place to get food here? We kinda left this morning without eating breakfast," said Sonic.

"Sorry. You'll have to take the train to Emerald City to get something. All the workers out here bring their food from home," said Tom. By now, the Tornado was starting to move slowly across the runway towards the hanger at the end of the strip. As it passed by them, both Sonic and Tom started walking after it, the two chao flying alongside of Sonic.

"How long would I have to wait on the train?" asked Sonic.

"It runs between here and Emerald City about every fifteen minutes or so," said Tom.

"Way too slow for my tastes. Hey Tails," hollered Sonic, catching the young fox's attention. "I'm gonna go grab some food! Want anything in particular?"

"I'll take whatever you're going to have," answered Tails.

"Chilidogs it is then," said Sonic, looking back over at Tom. "Any good stands that sell them?"

"I think the hotdog vendor at the Central Station food court has those on his menu," said Tom.

"You two want anything?" asked Sonic, looking over at Comet and Drake.

"No thanks. I'll be fine till we actually go into the city," said Comet.

"Drake?" asked Sonic.

"I'm good. I want to see what kind of food they have at this chao garden, so I'm not gonna waste my appetite," said Drake.

"Good enough for me. Back in a flash," said Sonic before taking off in a gust of wind, vanishing from sight in an instant as he ran down the mesa's stairs that led to the train platform erected just above the jungle's canopy. Tom watched with amazement as he saw the blue blur race up the train station's stairs, into the station's entryway, and then appear again on the tracks as Sonic quickly vanished from view.

"Your friend is very fast," hollered Tom to Tails. Tails only smiled at the comment.

"Oh that's nothing. He's actually going pretty slow all things considered," said Tails. Tom gave a whistle.

"If that's slow for him, I'd love to see what fast is," said Tom as the Tornado reached the hanger. Tails carefully navigated the small plane into a spot near the far left front of the hanger, then cut the engine. As he climbed out, his eyes lit up as he took in the sight of something he didn't expect to see. At the other end of the hanger were two old school bi-planes, one purely silver in color, the other one a deep red with orange highlights.

"Where did you get those? I thought humans had abandoned these kinds of planes long ago," said Tails, running over to take a better look at the two planes.

"Oh those. They were donated to us by a private investor a few years ago. Of course, we don't use them. Can't even if we did. Both of the engines are busted, and frankly we don't have anyone on staff that can fix'em," said Tom.

"Mind if I take a look?" asked Tails.

"Sure," said Tom. Tails twisted his two tails together, then started spinning them as he took off into the air to come to a hover above the engine housing of the red plane.

"Well that's a handy trick you can do," said Tom, realizing his mouth was hanging open as he quickly shut it. "How long have you been able to do that?"

"As long as I can remember," said Tails as he propped open the engine compartment. He hovered in place for about a minute as he inspected the engine. Finally, he closed the compartment before flying over to the silver plane. Opening that one's engine compartment, he began examining it. Another minute ticked by before he reached up and closed that one's compartment. He then landed next to Tom. "I think I can fix them both, given a couple of hours on each one."

"Really?" asked Tom. He then gave a smile. "Tell you what. You fix them up, you can use them however you want." Tails looked up at Tom with a disbelieving look.

"Seriously?" he asked.

"Yeah. Technically, I'm in charge of those planes. And frankly, since we'll never use them, I'd rather see them get used by someone who knows what they're doing with them instead of them rusting away in our hanger," said Tom.

"That actually works out really well for me," said Tails.

"Why's that?" asked Tom.

"Well, I've almost finished working on an upgrade to the Tornado, but I'm hesitant to install it without giving it a field test. Problem was I had no spare plane to try it out on, but if you'll really let me use these things, that solves my problem," said Tails.

"Go for it then," said Tom.

"Thanks a lot Tom," Tails said. "I can't wait to get these things fixed and then finish the thing I brought with me. If it works, the Tornado will run circles around other planes." Suddenly, a huge gust of wind blew through the hanger entrance, nearly causing both chao to lose control of their flying as Sonic reappeared next to Tails, holding a chilidog in each hand.

"Sorry that took so long, little bro. That guy running the stand isn't the fastest on his feet," said Sonic.

"Thanks," said Tails as he took one of the dogs from the blue hedgehog.

"Do you know how hard it is not to fall when you make such a big gust of wind, Sonic?" asked Drake angrily.

"My bad," said Sonic.

"Sonic? _The_ Sonic Hedgehog?" asked Tom, looking over at Sonic.

"The one and only," said Sonic before taking a bite of his chilidog.

"Well, at least now I know why you're so fast. We've heard all kinds of stories about you even this far south," said Tom.

"Stories are one thing. Seeing me in action is something totally different," said Sonic.

"I can only imagine," said Tom.

"Before I forget, is it alright if Tails stays here for the time being since he's gonna be working on the Tornado?" asked Sonic.

"That's fine. There's always someone here, so he won't be alone and we have cots set up at the back of the hanger for when people need to take a nap," said Tom.

"You sure you're fine staying here, big guy?" asked Sonic.

"Yeah. I've got a lot of work to do and it won't get done if I go into the city with you," said Tails.

"Alright. Just don't work on this thing all day long. Take a break every now and again," said Sonic.

"I will," said Tails.

"Well, I'd better be off. I'm sure Mayor Pepper will be anxious to see me," said Sonic as he stuffed the last bite of his chilidog into his mouth, quickly chewing and swallowing it. He then held out his arms, letting the two chao fly into them before wrapping his arms around them. "I promise I won't go faster than a hundred."

"Thanks. I feel sick when you do go faster than that," said Comet.

"Please. I'd rather him go faster. It's a lot more fun when he does," said Drake. Sonic then took off out of the hanger, leaving Tails and Tom behind in a small gust of wind.

* * *

The Central Station of the Station Square district of Emerald City was bustling with people from all walks of life, from business men to labor workers, to parents with their children. As a small group of tourists waited on the train to arrive to take them out to the Mystic Ruins Airport, a rather large gust of wind blew past them before Sonic stopped in the middle of the tracks, startling the tourists.

"Only thing I hate about crowds is I can't run with them in the way…" said Sonic under his breath, looking at all the people walking about the train station. He then leaped off the tracks and over the small group of tourists, causing them all to duck, thinking he'd land right in the middle of them. Sonic looked back over his shoulder as he landed behind them. "Oh come on, I'm not that bad at jumping over stuff."

"Sonic, you have to remember they aren't used to seeing people do things like that," said Comet. Sonic gave a sigh, then nodded before turning back around.

"Yeah. I forget these humans only see the occasional mobian and that most of them they do see probably don't do the kinds of stuff I normally do," said Sonic. He then let go of the two chao, letting them hover off to either side of him. "So, let's drop you two off at the Emerald's Glow hotel first."

"We can't go to the important meeting with you?" asked Drake, looking crestfallen at hearing that.

"I doubt you'd like it anyways. Probably just boring talk is all you would see," said Sonic. At hearing that, Drake's face turned into a frown.

"Yeah. Never mind. I'd rather go to the garden," said Drake.

"Thought so," said Sonic. He then started walking towards the exit, making his way around the crowd of people as the two chao followed him from the air. As they exited the station, they were greeted with a beautiful view of the ocean front.

"I can see why the humans built there city along the coast. It's gorgeous," said Comet, taking in the view.

"That it is," said Sonic. He then walked over to a man dressed in a uniform standing at the bottom of the stairs leading into the station. "Excuse me. You wouldn't happen to know where the Emerald Glow's hotel is at would ya?"

"Why you're looking at it, sir," said the man, pointing with his left hand to a twenty story building sitting at the edge of the beach. While connected with the other buildings that led further into the city, it still stood out by the sheer height of the building compared to the smaller housing buildings that were connected to it.

"Thanks," said Sonic, motioning for the two chao to follow him. Both Comet and Drake flew down the stairs after Sonic as he stared to jog across the street and up to the hotel's entrance. The sliding glass doors opened, allowing the three companions to enter into the grand lobby of the hotel. Various expensive paintings lined the walls of the giant, three story tall room. A huge crystal laced chandelier hung from the middle of the room, lighting the whole room with a warm glow. A service desk was situated near the back of the room, with a set of elevators off to the left of the desk.

"Very…interesting tastes to say the least…" said Sonic.

"I agree. This is way fancier of place than I thought it would be," said Comet in.

"Looks ugly to me," said Drake.

"Welcome," said a man in a bell hop uniform as he walked over to them. "Are you here to check-in?"

"Yes, actually. Name's Sonic Hedgehog. I believe Mayor Pepper has me all set up?" asked Sonic.

"Ah yes. Mr. Hedgehog, we've been expecting you. Mayor Pepper ordered our best room to be saved for your arrival," said the bell hop, leading the group of three over to the front desk.

"I don't need anything fancy," said Sonic, his face frowning. "Just a room with a bed and shower is all I need."

"I'm afraid Mayor Pepper insists that you take the room we have provided," said the bell hop. Sonic groaned lightly, then nodded.

"Fine, but don't expect me to give any tips cause I'm staying in the fancy room," said Sonic.

"None expected, sir. Mayor Pepper has told us of your visit, and we are quite frankly relieved. This creature's been scaring off our tourists," said the bell hop as they arrived at the front desk.

"Name please?" asked the man behind the desk.

"Sonic," answered Sonic.

"Ah yes. The penthouse room Mayor Pepper ordered us to save," said the man, handing Sonic a small plastic card. "I'm assuming the two chao with you are going to be staying in the Chao Garden on the top floor?"

"Yeah. That's alright leaving them there the whole time I'm here, right?" asked Sonic.

"Absolutely. The Chao Garden was designed to make a floor of our hotel as accommodating to them as possible," said the man.

"Sounds cool to me," said Sonic. He then looked back at the two chao as they hovered behind him. "Ready to see it, cause I know I want to."

"I guess so. I'm just nervous about seeing new chao after all this time," said Comet.

"I'm not. I want to see what they look like and act like," said Drake.

"That's the attitude Drake. Dive right in to the fun," said Sonic, smiling. The trio then made their way to the elevators, Sonic pressing the 'up' button. One of the doors immediately chimed, opening up. Walking into the elevator, Sonic then pressed the top floor button, the doors closing as the elevator began moving up the shaft.

As the elevator chimed again, signaling their arrival on the Chao Garden floor, the doors opened to a sight that left the three of them stunned as they walked out. The whole floor was one giant room, with several areas set up in various ways. The basic layout of the floor was marble tiles, but only about a third of the floor was actually covered by it. Off to the right of the elevator was a significant patch of grass covering nearly a third of the room with several small palm trees growing out of the patch. Taking up nearly a third of the left side of the room was a small pond with a basic looking temple situated in the middle of it, a fountain resting in the middle of the temple with a statue of a baby chao holding flowers sitting on top of the fountain. But what really had shocked them were all the chao frolicking about in the grass and the pond, half of which were accompanied by human and mobian children, all of which were being watched over by their parents who were sitting on benches set up all over the room.

"Wow…I had no idea there would be this many people with chao in here," said Sonic.

"Neither did I. Only Angel and mine's village had this many chao bonded with people that I was aware of," said Comet. Not even saying anything, Drake flew over to one of the palm trees and began trying to pluck one of the fruit that was growing underneath the leaves.

"Your friend is an eager little one, isn't he?" asked a female voice off to Sonic and Comet's side. They both turned to see a woman in her early twenties with long black hair and glasses looking at them with a smile.

"You could say that," said Sonic, returning the smile.

"He's young. I apologize for him," said Comet, bowing to the woman.

"My my, don't see many chao this polite come through here very often. Nor have I seen someone with two chao bonded with them before," said the woman. Sonic gave a small laugh and shook his head.

"Oh no, these two aren't mine. I'm just watching them for a couple of friends. The dragon looking one was actually purchased here as an egg about nine months ago. His partner just wanted me to bring him back here for some fun," said Sonic.

"I see. And where did the polite one come from?" she asked.

"She was left in our care when her bonded partner went off on a life finding journey four months ago," said Sonic.

"Huh…Sounds like your owner's a serious person," said the woman to Comet.

"She can be, but she's also very kind. I wouldn't want to be bonded with anyone else in the world other than my mistress," said Comet.

"I hear that from all the chao here, sweetie, but I can understand why they all say it," said the woman before extending her right hand towards Comet. "My name's Julie, by the way. I run this place."

"Nice to meet you, Julie. My name's Comet," said Comet, reaching out with her right arm and letting it be grasped by Julie, the two of them shaking. "And the young dragon chao that came with us is named Drake."

"Well, I'm sure I'll get to properly meet him later," said Julie, looking over to where Drake now sat on the ground, munching away on the piece of fruit he had liberated from the tree.

"Well, I'll let you three get acquainted. Mayor Pepper's expecting me," said Sonic.

"Okay, Sonic. We'll see you later on," said Comet.

"And keep an eye on Drake for me, will ya? Make sure he stays out of trouble," said Sonic.

"I will," said Comet, giving a small smile.

* * *

The glow of the full moon above Emerald City cast its light upon the sleeping metropolis. Very few cars were traveling the normally packed roads, the late hour of the evening leaving most people sleep in their homes. A single helicopter flew between the buildings as it headed towards City Hall, a ball of pink light following closely behind it as several police cars followed on the ground. The noise of the police sirens perked up Sonic's ear as he stood on top of one of the many buildings of the city's skyline. He had been patrolling Station Square for the last two hours, trying to find any trace of the water creature that had been attacking the city. His meeting with Mayor Pepper had been anything but helpful, the city's leader unable to give him any new information that was useful. As the noise of the sirens grew louder, Sonic walked over to the edge of the roof he was on, looking down just in time to see the police cars go racing past the building he was on.

"Well, guess that's as good an indication as any that this thing's showed its face," said Sonic as he leapt off the roof, landing on the street below before taking off after the cars. As the cars rounded the street that they were headed down, they all pulled up in front of City Hall, the helicopter that had been ahead of them illuminating the front of the building with its flood light. Standing on top of the outcropping that hung over the building's stairs was a humanoid creature made out of water. A pair of jester-like dreadlocks came out of its head, a pair of solid green eyes dotted the front of its face, and what looked like a brain rested in the middle of its head. As soon as the cars stopped moving, policemen started pouring out of them with their guns drawn.

"Hold it right there monster!" shouted one of the policemen through a megaphone. The creature hunched down, then leapt off the outcropping, landing in the middle of the flagpoles lining the path leading from the street to the entrance to City Hall. "Freeze!" The creature's eyes narrowed, then flung one of its arms outwards from its body, the limb extending as it slammed into one of the police cars, crushing the front of the car inwards and sending it sprawling down the street to slam into the side of a building on the other side of the road.

"We warned you! Open fire men!" shouted the policeman with the megaphone. Gunshots rang out as all the cops fired several rounds from their guns at the creature. But as the gunfire stopped, the humans, who had been confident up till that point, suddenly panicked as all the bullets they had shot at the watery creature dribbled out of its body, bouncing across the concrete ground. "Our guns don't do anything! Retreat men!" shouted the voice over the megaphone. The creature took a couple steps towards the humans as they were now turning and running away, but the creature then stopped as it spotted something land on top of one of the police cars.

"So you're the thing that's been causing all the problems?" asked Sonic, looking down from his vantage point on top of one of the cop cars. The creature regarded him for a couple moments, then flung its arm out again, Sonic leaping over the limb as clipped the top of the car, sheering off the lights on top of it before the limb retracted back to its original shape. As Sonic landed on the ground in front of the car, he gave a small whistle. "Oh yeah. You'll definitely be fun to play with." The creature then flung its arm out again at Sonic, who dodged to the left, then shot forward, curling into a spindash as he plowed through the creature, its body exploding in a spray of water as it rained on the ground. But as quickly as its body had been split apart, the water making up the creature rapidly pooled itself together, morphing back into the creature. It then turned around to look at Sonic who was leaning against one of the flagpoles calmly.

"Back for more, eh?" asked Sonic. The creature's eyes narrowed before it raised both of its arms straight out from its body. It then began to rapidly spin around, its arms extending outwards as it spun. Sonic watched from where he was at, patiently waiting as the creature's arms came ever closer to him. At the last second, Sonic leaped high above the creature's attack, curling into another spindash before landing on top of the creature's head, it's body falling apart for a second time. Once again, the creature gathered itself as fast as it could, then turned to where Sonic was standing with his arms crossed. "I thought this would be more of a challenge. I'm about to fall asleep here."

Angry over hearing that comment, the creature leaped up on top of one of the flagpoles lining the pathway, then stretched its arm down at Sonic. The cerulean hedgehog waited till the last second, then moved out of the way and over to the flagpole furthest from the one the creature was standing on. The creature then jumped over to that flagpole and repeated its attack. Sonic merely moved off to the side again.

"You won't beat me that way," taunted Sonic. The creature then jumped down off the flagpole, only to have Sonic intercept its fall halfway as he blew through the creature's body yet again with another spindash. This time, though, as the creature's body pooled together, instead of morphing back into its humanoid shape, it instead started moving rapidly away from the pathway and out towards the street. "Aw come on! Where you going?" asked Sonic as he ran after the puddle of water. But before he could catch up to it, it went into a storm drain and vanished from view. "Man…That was too easy…" He waited there about half a minute to make sure the creature wasn't just playing possum with him. After being satisfied that he'd run the thing off, he raced away from City Hall and back towards the Emerald's Glow hotel to turn in for the night. As Sonic raced away, a hidden witness to the fight gave a small laugh from his vantage point on a building that overlooked the pathway.

"He took the bait, as I knew he would," said Dr. Eggman from within his hovercraft. "And according to the radar I made, the seventh Chaos Emerald is now somewhere nearby, though I have no idea where exactly. But that's no matter. Chaos did his job, now all I need to do is tail that little hedgehog till he reveals where his emerald is at. Then it'll be like taking candy from a baby." Eggman let out a loud fit of laughter as his hovercraft sped away from the sight of the battle.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

A cool morning breeze blew through the ruins of the Master Emerald shrine, the small part of what was left of the once massive gem still resting in its spot as Mighty sat at the top of the stairs leading into the shrine, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. It had been a week since the Master Emerald had been shattered, the armadillo faithfully having stayed by the shrine ever since Knuckles had ventured off to look for whatever shards he could find on the island, but despite Knuckles' worry, the water creature that had attacked the crimson echidna had not reappeared. Mighty gave a small yawn, stretching his limbs before the sound of rustling of the underbrush leading into the jungle next to the shrine caught his attention. Leaping to his feet, his muscles tensed as he looked back at where the noise had come from. But his worry that it was the creature was laid to rest as instead Knuckles emerged from the dense jungle, a large brown sack draped over his back.

"Oh it's you. I thought that creature might have finally come back," said Mighty, letting his tense state subside as he ran down the shrine stairs and over to Knuckles.

"You mean you haven't seen it since that night?" asked Knuckles, surprise evident on his face.

"Nope. It's been quiet as a church since you left," said Mighty. Eyeing the bag, he motioned with his head at it. "You find all of them?" Knuckles smiled as he started walking towards the shrine, Mighty following him.

"You doubted me? The only ones left to find are the ones north of here, off the island," said Knuckles as they started walking up the stairs leading to the Master Emerald.

"About how much of it do you think flew off the island?" asked Mighty as they reached the top of the stairs.

"Not sure. I'll have a better idea once I've reconstructed what I've gathered so far," said Knuckles as he slide the sack off his shoulder and onto the ground. Opening it, both of them were greeted with the warm glow of the many Master Emerald shards Knuckles had found on the island. Knuckles then took a handful of them and tossed them over the remains of the Master Emerald. The shards came to a stop over top of it as Knuckles held out his hands, willing the shards to combine with the remains of the giant gem. Repeating this process till he had emptied the sack of shards, Knuckles sighed as he looked upon the Master Emerald in its current state. Nearly half of the gem had been restored, but it still had a fair ways to go till it would be complete once again. "Not nearly as finished as I thought it would be with what all I found."

"Yeah. Looks to me like we're still missing about half of it," said Might.

"Looks that way…" said Knuckles. "Guess all I can do is head towards the other shards at this point and hope I find them all."

"Hopefully they all aren't in that city," said Mighty.

"Yeah…Frankly, I haven't dealt with any humans outside of Eggman before. Never wanted to, but I might have to if I'm gonna find all the missing pieces of the Master Emerald," said Knuckles. "Mind staying here a while longer while I go search for them?"

"It's already been a week. If you think I'd bail on you at this point, then you don't know me very well," said Mighty.

"Thanks," said Knuckles. He then sighed as he came to a realization about something. "Guess I'll have to swim to the mainland. Thankfully we didn't land that far away from shore."

"I'd get a boat to come back here whenever you do. Might be hard to swim with a bag full of shards," said Mighty.

"Point taken," said Knuckles as he began walking down the stairs, heading in the direction of the shore of the island.

* * *

_Splash!_ Sonic felt the small wave of water hit him before he could even open his eyes, letting out an annoyed groan as his legs were now soaking wet from the aftermath of a human child doing a cannonball into the deep end of the pool located right outside the back entrance to the Emerald's Glow hotel.

"Sorry about that," he heard the child's mother say to him.

"No problem," said Sonic back to the mother, closing his eyes again as he tried to relax in the beach chair he was laying in. He had just come from meeting with Mayor Pepper, telling him about how he had run the water creature off the night before. After discussing it, the two had agreed that Sonic would stay a few more nights, just to make sure he had run the thing off for good. As he lay there, a familiar noise caught his ear. _Do I hear a plane?_ he thought to himself. Suddenly, people all over the pool area were starting to shout out cries of horror. Opening an eye, he glanced up in the direction the noise was coming from to spot a silver bi-plane flying crazily all over the place, smoke pouring from the engine housing. Opening both eyes, he took a hard look at the plane, trying to see if the pilot was in over his head. But when his eyes saw who was behind the wheel of the plane, he shot to his feet.

"Tails!?" he cried, recognizing the two-tailed fox that was now spiraling to the ground in an out of control bi-plane. Sonic could only watch helplessly as the plane finally came crashing down on a small island a good mile away from shore. Thankfully for Sonic, there were pathways connecting very small islands to the one that Tails had crashed on. Not wasting another second, Sonic shot from the pool area, scaring everyone from the sonic boom that sounded as he left. As he reached the first pathway, he came to a stop to examine it better.

_I'd better take it slow on these paths. The sea water's probably made them slippery as I'll get out to run across,_ he thought to himself. He then jogged slowly out onto the first wooden pathway. As he passed by a fairly deep section of ocean water that the path stretched across, the whole pathway was jolted by a large killer whale crashing through the bridge near the shoreline. Sonic turned around just in time to see the whale slam into the bridge a second time, this time much closer to where the blue hedgehog was standing. _Oh you've gotta be kidding me!?_ he thought before he took off a dead run, narrowly dodging the whale's next strike as it plowed through the bridge right where he had been standing. Zipping across to the small island, Sonic didn't stop, but rather took off across the next pathway leading further out from shore.

The whale wasted no time following after him, but even as it destroyed the second pathway, Sonic was already off of it and was blasting his way down the fourth bridge that lead out to the island that Tails had crashed on. As the hedgehog flew off the final bridge, the whale abandoned its attack on the bridges. Watching the whole event unfold, the watery creature from the other night floated in the sea nearly undetectable, annoyed that its plan had failed. The creature let go of its mind control over the killer whale as it departed for the deep ocean.

* * *

"Oh man…That could've gone better… " mumbled Tails to himself as he sat next to the wreckage of the silver bi-plane. He had just barely managed to get himself out of the plane seconds before it had hit, his ability to fly being the only thing that had saved him from a hard landing on the beach.

"Hey Tails! You alright?" he heard a familiar voice holler at him. A second later, Sonic appeared in a gust of wind next to Tails side.

"I'm fine. Can't say the same for the plane though," joked Tails as he climbed to his feet. He winced slightly as he thought of something. "I hope Tom's not gonna be mad at me for crashing one of his planes…"

"That aside, you gave me a good scare there, little bro," said Sonic, crossing his arms over his chest. "What happened anyways? You're way too good of a pilot to just crash like that."

"Yeah. I was doing a test flight using my new upgrade for the Tornado," said Tails as he walked over to the front of the plane, kneeling down as he started to unscrew something off the nose cone. "Guess it still has a few bugs to work out. But I think I know what went wrong, so it should work next time."

"What kind of upgrade could trash a whole plane like that?" asked Sonic, walking over to where Tails was just finishing unscrewing the object off the plane.

"This," said Tails, holding up the device that he had brought with them from Knothole. He then turned it over so that the open end was facing up. He then reached in and pulled out the indigo Chaos Emerald from the device's housing.

"Why use our Chaos Emerald as an upgrade? You do know that thing trashes anything mechanical it touches right?" asked Sonic.

"That's just it. I've been working on this device as a means to tap into a Chaos Emerald's power without it shorting out the Tornado in the process," said Tails. "If I can make this work, along with the other modifications I've been working on, then the Tornado will be a heck of a lot faster and a force to be reckoned with in an aerial fight."

"If you say so," said Sonic. He then narrowed his eyes as he thought of something. "You _did_ take breaks from working on this thing like I told you to, didn't ya?" Tails looked down at the ground sheepishly.

"If by breaks you mean stopping long enough to eat and sleep, then yes," answered Tails. Sonic sighed, then closed his eyes and shook his head.

"Okay. We're taking your new toy back to the airport and then you're coming into the city with me for the rest of the day," said Sonic.

"But the Tornado's engine is in pieces right now! I took it apart to do a complete overhaul of it! It'll take me hours to get it ready to fly again!" cried Tails, obviously upset that his engineering venture was coming to a halt.

"It can wait. I brought you here to get you away from that stuff for a little while. You stay cooped up in that workshop at home most of the time anymore," said Sonic. Tails looked crestfallen at Sonic's decision, but he gave a soft sigh, then a nod of his head to signify that he agreed to do what Sonic had suggested. "Okay. Now that that's settled, you're gonna have to fly us back to the mainland. Some crazy whale chased me out here and wrecked the bridges."

"Why'd it chase after you?" asked Tails as he put the Chaos Emerald back into the device, then handed it to Sonic to hold onto. Sonic merely shrugged his shoulders.

"Ya got me," said Sonic as Tails flew above his head. Sonic reached up with his free hand, Tails grasping it with both of his. He then took off towards the shore, passing by the destroyed bridges below them. As they reached the shore, Tails brought them both down right next to a large purple cat mobian who was fishing. "Hope that whale didn't scare off all the fish for you," said Sonic to the mobian.

"Oh it's not fish I'm trying to catch. I'm trying to catch my friend Froggy," answered the mobian. Both Sonic and Tails gave each other a sideways glance, then shrugged.

"Well, I hope you catch him mister," said Tails as the two walked back towards the Emerald's Glow hotel.

"Thanks! And the name is Big, by the way!" hollered the mobian as Sonic and Tails rounded the corner leading into the pool area of the hotel.

"We'll take the train this time. I feel like taking it easy for a little bit," said Sonic as they entered the hotel.

* * *

Near one of the busiest streets of Emerald City, what had started as a few people staring up at one of the buildings had transformed into a small crowd. Several people were chatting frantically amongst themselves, pointing up at the building in question. The crowd quickly drew the attention of a couple of police officers stationed near the end of the block.

"Okay people, what's going on here?" asked one of the police officers. But rather than answer the policeman, the crowd's attention stayed focused on whatever it was that had drawn their attention. Realizing he wasn't going to get an answer from the crowd, the officer instead turned his gaze up towards where the crowd was looking. What his eyes took in caused his mouth to drop. Climbing up the side of the brick apartment building was a crimson furred mobian.

_It's gotta be here somewhere,_ thought Knuckles to himself as he punched a new hole in the wall to scale up. He had been searching for nearly an hour and had already found two small shards of the Master Emerald on a couple of nearby rooftops. Still, he could feel another shard was close by. Stopping to get his bearings, his ears finally picked up the crowd's hollering. Looking down, he saw the small crowd of people all pointing at him. "Ugh…Don't those people have better things to do than to gawk at me?" he asked himself. Suddenly, he felt something smack him in the side of the head.

"You hooligan! Don't you mobians have any respect for public property!" shouted an old human lady from the window Knuckles was hanging next to, a rolled up newspaper in her hands. Knuckles glared at the lady, but scoffed and started climbing up the wall again, annoyed to have been hit in the head, but realizing that he couldn't take out his annoyance on an elderly person. As he came to within ten feet of the top of the building, he spied a small hole in brick right in front of him. Looking into the hole, the soft glow of another Master Emerald shard glared back at him. Smiling to himself, Knuckles punched the hole open wide enough for him to reach in and grab the shard. Climbing up onto the roof, he sat down to take a quick break from his climb.

"Well, that's a good start. Still, I feel a very large amount of the Master Emerald's power radiating a ways off to the east," he said to himself. After taking a minute to rest, he walked over to the edge of the building, then jumped off as he started gliding in the direction of the source of the power. As he glided from rooftop to rooftop, he crashed himself into the side of one of the largest buildings in the city. _It's in here,_ he thought to himself as he dropped down, landing in the middle of the street, causing several cars to slam on their brakes to avoid hitting him, the drivers of said cars screaming obscenities at Knuckles before the echidna walked calmly out of the road, ignoring the humans. As he walked up to the door, a large poster posted on the side of the wall caught his attention. Normally, a poster wouldn't draw a second glance from the echidna, but what was on the poster couldn't be ignored. It showed a silhouette of a mobian standing in a boxing ring with humans all surrounding said mobian, a large green gem pictured above the people. The text on the poster was a challenge, claiming that one mobian enters the ring and takes on as many humans as are willing to fight. Whoever comes out on top wins the gem.

"Using a shard of the Master Emerald as a prize for a fight? Not on my watch," said an annoyed Knuckles. He then gritted his teeth before he pushed his way through the front door of the city's casino. "Someone show me where the human that has that gem prize is at! I have some business with him!" he shouted, catching everyone's attention. One of the casino workers quickly ran over to Knuckles, a large smile plastered on his face as the other people's attention went back to their tables and slots.

"Oh thank goodness! We were beginning to wonder if any mobian would take us up on that offer," said the worker.

"I'm not here to fight, I'm here to take that gem from you. It belongs to me," said Knuckles. At hearing this, the worker's happy demeanor did a one-eighty.

"Now you listen here, mobian," said the worker, pressing his finger into Knuckles chest, which surprised the echidna by how bold this human was being with him. "We found that gem on our roof a week ago. No one came to claim it, so by law it's now our property. So if you mean to cause a problem, I'll get the police involved and haul your fuzzy little hide downtown to a cell." Knowing he wouldn't get anywhere with threats, and knowing he wouldn't have enough time to find the shard before the law enforcement would show up to deal with him, Knuckles softened his stance.

"Alright…So what do I have to do to 'win' this gem back?" he asked, annoyance heavily laced in his words.

"All you have to do is enter our ring and fight any human who wants to take you on. If you last till no one else wants to challenge you, the gem is yours," said the worker.

"And if by some miracle I lose, who gets it then?" asked Knuckles.

"Why, whoever beats you of course," said the worker. Knuckles smiled slightly at this.

"So, any rules other than making them quit against me?" asked Knuckles.

"Just don't kill anyone, of course. Aside from that, you can use any means to make your competitors quit," said the worker.

"Okay. You got yourself a fighter," said Knuckles.

"Excellent. The fights begin tonight at nine o'clock sharp," said the worker.

"See you then," said Knuckles, turning to leave. _That'll give me some time to find more shards in the city while I wait for tonight, _he thought.

"By the way, what's your name?" asked the worker.

"Knuckles," said the echidna as he walked out through the doors leading back to the street. As the worker watched him leave, he gave a small huff.

"Mobians…Think they have to use tough names to sound tough," said the worker before turning and walking back into the crowds of people all at their slots and tables gambling away their wages.

* * *

"And that's what I think went wrong, or at least I hope that's what went wrong," said Tails as he and Sonic walked up the stairs leading to the mesa the airport was situated on. Tails had been explaining in great detail what his device had been constructed to do ever since they had arrived from the bullet train. Sonic had been lost since the start, but he'd been humoring Tails by nodding and smiling the whole time the fox had been talking. As the two mobians reached the top of the stairs, a very familiar fit of laughter erupted from above them, sending a chill down Tails spine and causing a smile to form on Sonic's mouth.

"Well, if it isn't Sonic!" hollered the voice of Dr. Eggman as he flew in his hovercraft above a rather large clearing off to the side of the airport. His hovercraft now sported a giant engine attachment on the aft end, and two large attachments on either side of the craft with missile ports on the top of each one and a giant hole in the front of both.

"Hey look Tails, it's a giant talking egg," joked Sonic, pointing his thumb up at Eggman.

"Silence!" shouted Eggman. "I, Dr. Ivo Eggman, the greatest scientific genius in the world, have big plans in the works! And now I intend to put them in motion!"

"That's usually trouble coming from you," said Tails.

"So, what do you want from us Eggman?" asked Sonic. Eggman let another fit of laughter fly from his mouth.

"I want all of the Chaos Emeralds, and I plan to start with the one you have in your possession," said Eggman.

"Yeah, like that'll ever happen," said Sonic.

"Just what I thought you'd say, you prickly pest. So we do this the hard way, as usual," said Eggman. Sonic turned around to Tails and tossed him his device, the Chaos Emerald still tucked away in its holding slot.

"Stay down and keep that emerald safe. I'll deal with Eggman," said Sonic.

"Let him have it, Sonic," said Tails before he ran over next to the airport's hanger. Sonic returned his attention to Eggman just in time to see a barrage of missiles get launched from the ports on the attachments. Sonic waited till the last moment, then zipped away from the missiles as they blew holes open in the rock of the mesa. Another salvo was fired by Eggman, but once again Sonic dodged them at the last second. But as Sonic stopped to see if another round of missiles was headed his way, he was instead greeted by the sight of two giant drills barreling down at him as they extended from the giant holes on the two side attachments of Eggman's hovercraft as the craft took a nose dive at him.

"Whoa!" cried Sonic, leaping out of the way just as Eggman's hovercraft slammed into the ground, the drills embedding themselves into the rock floor. Sonic wasted no time on the rebound, shooting forward as soon as his feet had touched ground. Curling into a spindash, he slammed full force into the left side attachment, burrowing a giant hole through it as the left drill stopped functioning. Eggman was cursing up a storm as he tried to free his hovercraft from the rock floor of the mesa's peak. But with the left drill no longer functioning, he was unable to wrestle the craft free of the rock. Suddenly the right drill ceased to function as Sonic plowed through the right side attachment.

"That outta take the wind out of your sails," said Sonic as he uncurled from his spindash, looking over the damage he had caused.

"No no no! The controls won't respond!" shouted Eggman, slamming his fists repeatedly into the hovercraft's controls.

"Nice job Sonic!" shouted Tails as he started to run towards the two combatants after hearing Eggman's proclamation. Suddenly, Eggman's fits of rage subsided and a smile instantly formed on his lips.

"Gotch ya!" he cried as a mechanical arm shot out of a side compartment of the hovercraft, snatching the device from a very surprised Tails' hands. The attachments suddenly detached from the sides and rear of the hovercraft, allowing Eggman to right the craft into an upright position again.

"Oh no!" cried Tails as the arm retracted back to the hovercraft and dropped the device into Eggman's waiting hands. A few moments of fiddling with the device and he extracted the blue Chaos Emerald from its housing, discarding the device now that his true prize was in hand.

"Oh what gullible fools you both are!" laughed Eggman. "Come on out, Chaos! Time to eat!"

"Who's Chaos?" asked Sonic. He then noticed a puddle of water rise out of the ground next to Eggman's hovercraft. The puddle then rose up, rapidly morphing into the same watery creature Sonic had battled the night before. "On no, that's the same monster from last night!"

"A monster?" asked an alarmed Tails, taking in the sight of the creature for the first time. Eggman laughed as he tossed the indigo Chaos Emerald into the waiting hand of the creature. Suddenly, a burst of light came erupting forth from the creature, causing both Sonic and Tails to shield their eyes from the brightness. As soon as the light died down, they took in the sight that now was in front of them. The creature's right arm was now bigger and thicker with bones running through it, the Chaos Emerald resting in a socket that was in the palm bone of its hand. Its twin dreadlocks had receded a little bit back into its head, and its body had grown a little taller and more defined than it was before.

"Oh yes! It's just as the ancient stone tablet described!" cried Eggman, overjoyed at seeing the creature's new form. He then turned his attention back to Sonic and Tails. "Chaos' power and strength increases every time I feed him a Chaos Emerald. And I happen to know that the other six are in the near vicinity. It won't be long before I've feed him all seven emeralds and his power will know no equal. I'll then use Chaos to destroy Emerald City, upon which I will build New Robotropolis. A new city from which I will begin my campaign to conquer the world and build my Eggman Empire!"

"You've got another thing coming if you expect me to let you get away with that," said Sonic, taking an offensive stance.

"Oh I will get away with it, you spiny pincushion! Come on, Chaos. Let's go find another emerald, shall we?" said Eggman before he threw something out in front of his hovercraft. Sonic shot forward, trying to get in an attack. But the object Eggman threw suddenly exploded in a blast of light, blinding both of the mobians again and forcing Sonic to stop mid-attack. By the time the light died down and their eyes had readjusted, both Eggman and Chaos were gone.

"Hey! Are you two alright! What was that thing!?" cried Tom's voice. Both of them looked over at the airport tower, seeing Tom running over towards them.

"We're fine, Tom," answered Sonic as he reached the two of them.

"Was that Dr. Eggman by any chance you were fighting? I saw the whole thing from the tower," said Tom.

"That was him. Sorry to say, but seems like he's after Emerald City now," said Sonic.

"Was that also the creature that I heard about on the news that the police have been unable to catch?" asked Tom.

"Yeah. Eggman called him 'Chaos'," said Sonic.

"I'm sorry I let my guard down. If I hadn't, we'd still have our Chaos Emerald," said Tails, looking down at the ground in grief. His head then shot upright as he realized something. "Oh no! Did Eggman break my upgrade?" Tails ran over to where the device that had held the indigo Chaos Emerald was now lying on the ground. Picking it up, he started looking over the device as fast as he could.

"Tails, this isn't the time to worry about that," said Sonic.

"Sorry," said Tails, finally looking up from his inspection of the device. "I know this is bad news. If Eggman gets the other Chaos Emeralds, then he'll have a creature that we can't hope to stop. But maybe my upgrade can help us at some point if we need to get the Tornado involved."

"I know. At least Eggman let it slip that the other six are somewhere in the area. Means I won't have to go far to find them," said Sonic.

"Let me come with you, Sonic. I want to make up for losing our emerald," said Tails.

"I don't know, Tails. I told Sal I'd keep you out of trouble, and going up against Eggman is the worst way to go about doing that," said Sonic. Tails face turned into a frown at hearing this.

"Oh come on Sonic! I've been training when not working on stuff in my workshop to be able to handle myself in a fight," said Tails. He then ran over to one of the palm trees that lined the runway of the airport. "Watch this!" Tails took a fighting stance, then after a few seconds ticked by he swung his body around at a high speed, his twin tails slamming hard into the trunk of the palm tree, snapping it like a twig from the force of the hit. Sonic whistled as he watched the tree tumble to the ground.

"Alright, you can come. Just remember to follow my lead like you did on Floating Island last year. And don't tell Sal I let you do this," said Sonic.

"Thanks Sonic," said Tails, his face beaming with joy.

"Now we just need a lead to follow," said Sonic.

"I think I might know where one of these emeralds is at," said Tom. Both mobians looked up at Tom.

"You sure?" asked Sonic, not quite believing that the human would know what it was they were looking for.

"I heard some of the explores that were on the train heading into the city talking about finding some weird purple gem that glowed out at their dig site. Tails had showed me the one that he brought with me that was blue, so I had been wondering if it was something similar to that. I'd say that whatever it is they found is probably what you're looking for," said Tom. A smile crossed Sonic's face after hearing what Tom had to say. He then looked over at Tails.

"Well, guess that's as good a place to start as any, don't you think?" asked Sonic to Tails.

"Sounds like it," said Tails, giving a nod of his head in agreement. Sonic returned his attention to Tom.

"Any idea where this dig site of theirs is at?" asked Sonic.

"I'm afraid I don't know exactly where it's at. Just that it's somewhere in Windy Valley, an area about ten miles to the west of here," said Tom.

"Good enough. That won't take us long to find," said Sonic. He looked back at Tails. "Ready to go, little bro?"

"You bet. Eggman won't get any more emeralds if we have anything to say about it," said Tails.

"That's the right mind set to have. Next stop, Windy Valley," said Sonic.

"Before we go," said Tails, turning back around to face Tom. "I'm sorry, but I crashed the plane I took with me this morning."

"So I'm guessing that little device you put on it didn't work?" asked Tom.

"Nope…Aren't you mad I ruined the plane?" asked Tails, a little confused as to why Tom didn't sound mad at him.

"Already told you that if you fixed them, they were yours to use, even if they get trashed in the process," said Tom.

"And that's why I wanted you to come with me. See that humans, for the most part, are nice people," said Sonic.

"Thanks Tom. I'll try not to wreck the other one," said Tails.

"I just told you not to worry about it, didn't I?" said Tom. Tails gave a smile.

"Alright Sonic. Just let me put this into the pilot's seat of the Tornado, then we can head for Windy Valley," said Tails.

"Just hurry," was all Sonic said as the two tailed fox ran towards the open hanger.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

_At least it's easy to tell where the humans have been out in the jungle,_ thought Sonic as he raced down one of the pathways cleared by explorers in the jungle. Tails was following him from above, keeping an eye out for the dig site that Tom had mentioned to them before they had left the airport. As they reached a clearing in the dense foliage, Sonic came to a stop.

"What's wrong?" asked Tails, stopping above him as well.

"Just that we have a choice to make right now," said Sonic, pointing at the five different pathways that lead out of the clearing. "I get that they wanted to explore the jungle, but they could've at least left a sign or something telling people which way to go."

"Give me a second and I'll see if I can't see anything from the air," said Tails.

"Go for it, little bro," said Sonic. Tails then flew high up into the air, cupping his hand over his eyes as he gazed out over the tree line. Suddenly, his eyes lit up as he spotted smoke coming off in the direction of the path leading to the southwest.

"I see smoke coming from that way Sonic," called Tails down to the blue hedgehog, pointing in the direction to go.

"Alright, then that's where we're headed," said Sonic. He then took off again down the path leading to the southwest, Tails taking off after him. After two miles, Sonic came to a screeching halt when he reached the edge of a cliff. Looking down into the valley below, he spotted several digging machines and dozens of humans dressed in explorers gear working at the various sites. Near the biggest tent was a smoking pit where several dozen cuts of meat were being cooked over a large fire, revealing to them the source of the smoke Tails had seen.

"Guess we found them," said Tails as he landed next to Sonic.

"Guess so. Let's get down there and see if we can find that Chaos Emerald," said Sonic. He then leapt off the side of the cliff, landing next to a couple of humans that were walking along the edge of the valley walls, scaring them from his sudden arrival as Tails landed next to him.

"Who are you and why did you scare us like that?" asked one of them.

"Sorry about that. Didn't mean to scare you guys. My friend and I just came out here to take a look at his purple gem you guys found the other day," said Sonic. Both of the humans looked at one another, then back at the two mobians.

"You mean that weird gem that we can't study because all our machines we use on it keep breaking?" asked the second human. Sonic smiled at hearing this.

"They break whenever you bring them into contact with it, don't they?" asked Sonic.

"Why yes. That's exactly what happens. How did you know?" asked the first human.

"I'd say it's definitely a Chaos Emerald then, don't you?" asked Tails, looking over at Sonic.

"Sounds like it," said Sonic. He then looked back at the humans. "Can you guys show us this gem by any chance?"

"I'm not sure. We were about to send it off to the museum in Westopolis last I heard," said the second human.

"Well, it might still be here. The boss wanted it to leave with the evening shift, didn't he?" asked the first human.

"Oh that's right," said the second human. "Well, if it's still here, it would be in the main research tent."

"Which one is that?" asked Tails.

"Big one next to the large fire that's cooking our lunch," said the first human.

"Thanks," said Sonic as he and Tails turned and started off in the direction of the large tent. As they passed by the various sites, some of the humans were looking up from what they were doing to eye the mobians as they walked by.

"Sonic…They're staring at us," said Tails, uncomfortable that people were watching the two of them as closely as they were.

"Humans…You'd think they'd never seen a mobian before," said Sonic with a slight hint of annoyance to his voice as they reached the large tent. Pulling back one of the flaps of the entrance, Sonic poked his head into the tent. "Hello?" he called out. A few humans were milling about in the tent, though most ignored Sonic's call. However, one human girl looked up from the pottery piece she was examining. She had dark skin, long blonde hair, blue eyes, and was dressed in similar gear as the other humans outside.

"Oh hello," said the human. She got up from her seat and walked over to the two mobians. "We don't get many guests out here. My name's Carla Prestor, lead researcher for our dig site. It's a pleasure to meet you." Sonic smiled as he heard her introduce herself.

"Likewise. My name's Sonic and this is my best bud Tails," said Sonic, motioning to Tails.

"Nice to meet you ma'am," said Tails.

"So, now that pleasantries are out of the way, what brings you out to our research site?" asked Carla.

"We heard you guys found a purple gem the other day that fries anything electronic it comes into contact with," said Sonic.

"Oh that thing," said Carla, her voice heavy with annoyance. "Yeah, we found it a few days ago at site four, but we have no clue what it is or why it wrecked all the equipment we used on it."

"Is it still here?" asked Tails.

"Yes. We were about to send it with one of our other researchers back to Westopolis tonight to send to the museum that sponsored our dig, but honestly, I'm afraid to stick that thing on an airplane after what it did to our stuff," said Carla.

"Mind if we take a look at it?" asked Sonic.

"Sure. It's over on the far examining table in that briefcase," said Carla, leading the two mobians towards the back of the tent. "Why are you two so interested in it anyways?"

"We think it might be a Chaos Emerald," said Tails.

"A Chaos Emerald? Never heard of that before, but you two seem to know what you're talking about," said Carla as they arrived at the table. She then reached over and opened the briefcase, a soft purple glow emitting from the case as Sonic and Tails got a good look at what lay within. Sitting in a padded slot in the middle of the case was the violet Chaos Emerald. "Is this one of these emeralds?"

"Sure is," said Sonic, smiling from ear to ear at seeing the gem. "Can we have it?"

"This thing is part of our finds at this dig site. Even if it does trash electronics, it's still our biggest find out here and I'd be a fool to let it go," said Carla.

"We don't want to keep it for ourselves. Dr. Eggman is after all seven of these and if he gets them, then Emerald City will be destroyed," said Tails.

"I've heard of Dr. Eggman. Why is he down here on the southern continent wanting to attack the human cities? I thought he was wrapped up in his war on the northern continent," said Carla.

"He lost his power base up north. He wants to take over all of Mobius now and build himself an empire to rule the planet. And if he gets the Chaos Emeralds, there's a very good chance he will succeed," said Sonic.

"Oh my…If that's true, then sending this thing to Westopolis will only cause Dr. Eggman to attack that city to get it back from us," said Carla, realizing now just how dangerous keeping the emerald would be. "Well…It might cost us our sponsor and our dig site losing this thing, but I'd rather not have the destruction of a city and the possible enslavement of the planet looming over our heads." She then reached into the briefcase and took the Chaos Emerald from its housing. She then tossed it at Sonic, who snatched it out of the air. "Just promise me you'll stop Dr. Eggman from doing whatever it is he plans to do with that thing."

"Don't worry. Eggman won't get away with his plans if I have anything to say about it," said Sonic. The two mobians then turned to walk out of the tent.

"Wait a sec. I think I might know where another one of these emeralds is at," said Carla. This statement stopped both Sonic and Tails in their tracks, both of them turning back to face her.

"You do?" asked Tails.

"Well, I think so. It might just be a big diamond for all I know, but the casino in Emerald City was advertising a new game that they're unveiling tonight at eight o'clock. Some kind of virtual pinball game where if you could beat the house top score, you'd win this really big white gem," said Carla.

"What do you think Sonic?" asked Tails, looking over at the cerulean hedgehog.

"Sounds to me like it's at least worth checking out. Thanks for the tip, Carla," said Sonic. Carla just smiled.

"Anytime, friends," said Carla as Sonic and Tails left the tent, leaving Carla to go back to the pottery piece she had been examining before they had drawn her attention away from it. As they walked towards the edge of the dig site, Sonic glanced down at his watch.

"Well, we got about four hours till the casino opens that game. I say we take this emerald back to the airport for safe keepings for now, then head into the city to get something to eat and then check in with Drake and Comet, spend some time with them before we go to the casino," said Sonic.

"Sounds good to me," said Tails.

"Also, just so we don't make them worry, don't mention what's going on to either of them. I want them to enjoy their time here, not be worrying every moment of the day about what's going on," said Sonic.

"You sure we shouldn't tell them?" asked Tails, unsure if that was the right thing to do.

"Yeah. It'll be alright. Let them have their fun," said Sonic.

"Alright. I won't tell them anything," said Tails.

* * *

As the sun sank into the horizon, Sonic and Tails walked along the sidewalk leading towards the casino. They had just finished up their time with Drake and Comet. Both of the chao had told them of all the fun they had been having with the other chao and their owners at the garden. Drake had been so preoccupied having fun that he actually hadn't gotten into any trouble since they had been dropped off. Comet had spent most of her time talking with every chao she could, listening to the stories they had to share about their time with their owners, Comet sharing her story whenever she was asked, to which most of the chao had been awestruck by the tale the violet chao had to share regarding her and Angel's time together.

"So a pinball game…Can't say I've ever played one of those before," said Sonic as they reached the entrance to the casino.

"I've heard about them. You use flippers to bounce a metal ball up ramps and off bumpers to score points without letting the ball fall into the hole at the bottom," said Tails.

"Sounds interesting to say the least," said Sonic as the two of them walked inside. The sounds of the slot machines and video poker were the first things to hit their ears, as was the bright lights of said machines the first thing their eyes took in.

"Wow…I don't think I've seen this many machines in one spot except in Robotropolis," said Tails.

"I think I'm in the same boat, big guy," said Sonic. He then waved at a male usher that was standing near the front counter. Seeing that he was being flagged down, the man walked over to the two of them.

"Hello, and welcome to Diamond Dust Casino. What can I do for the two of you this evening?" he asked politely.

"We're looking for the new pinball game you're supposed to be bring out tonight. The one that has the big gem as the prize," said Sonic.

"Ah yes. We're just about to unveil that new virtual pinball game in the east wing of the building. If you hurry, you should get there in time to see its grand opening," said the usher.

"Thanks," said Sonic as he and Tails started walking towards the area the usher had mentioned. As they entered the east wing of the building, they noticed a large machine sitting in the middle of the area with monitors situated all over the immediate area surrounding the machine. On one side of the machine, a giant monitor was resting in it with a display announcing that the new "Poker Virtual Pinball Game" was less than a minute away from being open for play. But it was the thing resting in a clear holding case at the top of the machine that drew Sonic's eyes. "Up there Tails," he said, pointing up at the case. Tails' gaze followed Sonic's to the holding case where resting inside it was a white gem that was softly glowing.

"The white Chaos Emerald!" exclaimed Tails.

"Sure enough. Let's see if we can't get it from these guys," said Sonic. The two of them walked up to where the velvet ropes separated them from the machine. Spotting a man with short black hair dressed in an expensive looking blue suit, Sonic called out to him. Noticing that he was being called at, the man walked over to the two mobians.

"Hello. I take it you two are interested in playing our Poker Virtual Pinball game?" he asked.

"Actually, we need that gem that's in the case," said Sonic.

"Well, you're welcome to try and win it. Of course, you'll have to beat the house's top score to win it," said the man with a smile.

"Look, long story short, Dr. Eggman's after that gem and he'll stop at nothing to get it. Me and my friend here are trying to keep him from getting that thing. Is there any way you'll give it to us so we can keep it out of his hands?" asked Sonic. Hearing this, the man's pleasant demeanor switched to one of annoyance.

"I absolutely won't give you this precious gem, even if what you say is true. We've been advertising this game and prize for the better part of a month. If you want it so badly, win it like everyone else has to," said the man in a huff before swiftly turning and walking away from them towards a stage set up near the machine.

"Well, that could've gone better," said Tails.

"Yeah…All that guy cares about is profiting off the emerald. Sad to say there are some humans like that," said Sonic.

"Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the grand opening of the Nights Virtual Pinball game!" said the man in the suit as he addressed the crowd of people gathered to see the unveiling of the game. "The latest in virtual gaming technology is now yours to try and master as you shoot for our ultimate prize, the white gem resting in the case at the top of the machine! But, to claim this magnificent prize, you must first beat the house top score." People began whispering amongst themselves, all wondering what that score would be.

"The game is simple," continued the man. "Scattered across the pinball map are virtual cards that will collected as the ball travels over them. Every time you collect five cards, they will form a poker hand that will then determine how many points they are worth. The better your hand, the more points you score. Of course, you can score points by doing actions that you'd perform in any pinball game. And now to unveil the house score you must beat!" Everyone's attention turned to the monitor as the man held out his arm towards it. The screen suddenly switched from its promotional display to scoreboard. All of the scores were blank except for the one at the top, which read five trillion points. At seeing this, most of the people started talking about how much of a scam the game was and began to disperse, at which the man looked nervously uncomfortable as he realized not many people were going to take the bait to play.

"So…Five trillion, eh?" asked Sonic. He then looked over at the man in the suit. "How much to play?" The man smiled as he walked back over to the two mobians.

"Well, since there isn't as much interest to try this game out as I thought there'd be for people, I'll let you try it for free, just to get the ball rolling and get some people interested in trying it out," said the man. Sonic grinned at hearing this.

"Okay. I'll give it a go," said Sonic as he walked with the man to the front of the machine. A virtual helmet sat on the controls of the machine, which Sonic placed over his head. A few seconds ticked by before the screen on the helmet lit up, displaying the pinball map for him to see. On the monitors above, the pinball map was also being displayed for people that wanted to watch. Sonic put his hands on the flipper controls, then pressed the button that launched the ball into the map. However, it was very quick to see that Sonic wasn't very good at the game as the first ball fell out of play within the first twenty seconds, with only two virtual cards being picked up within that time. The next two balls weren't much better, with the blue hedgehog only managing to get eight more cards before his final ball was lost. Taking off the helmet, Sonic just closed his eyes and shook his head. A few people had stopped to watch the game play out on the monitors, but their interest had faded instantly after seeing how badly Sonic played the game.

"Well, guess that's a no go for me," said Sonic.

"Let me give it a try Sonic," said Tails. Sonic looked back up at the man, who still looked nervous at the fact that no new interest had been shown to the game.

"How about it letting my friend give it a shot?" asked Sonic. The man sighed, then nodded.

"One free try for him too since you couldn't even last long enough to get anyone interested in it. But that's the last time. I'm gonna have to start charging you after that," said the man.

"Okay Tails. You're up. Make it count," said Sonic as he walked past Tails as the young fox walked in front of the machine. Placing the helmet on his head, Tails waited a few seconds till the virtual screen lit up for him. Pressing the button to launch the ball, Tails watched with total focus as the ball flew around the pinball map, passing through cards as he kept the ball in play much better than Sonic had. As seconds turned into minutes, more and more people were stopping to watch the monitors as Tails' score started to climb. After nearly ten minutes of not losing the ball once, and several poker hands worth of cards later, he had hit the one trillion mark. By this point, the man in the suit was looking even more nervous. Not because interest in the game was lacking at this point, but rather due to the fact that the two tailed fox was crushing the game on his first try.

As Tails hit the twenty minute mark, he finally lost his first ball. But people were now chatting heavily amongst themselves as they watched, each one wondering if the young mobian would win the game on the first night it was open. Already, his score was sitting at two and a half trillion and he had only lost one of his three balls. As Tails launched his second ball, Sonic watched the monitor with a grin plastered over his face, his own belief held in suspense as he watched his best friend tear the game apart like he had played it for years. Another twenty minutes ticked by, Tails' score rising higher and higher with each passing second. Finally, he lost his second ball as it fell out of play. His score now rested at four and a half trillion.

_One ball left. I can do this, _thought Tails as he launched the final ball onto the map. His face twisted into one of pure concentration as he sent the ball bouncing around the map, collecting all the cards he could. As his score hit the 4.9 trillion mark and his last set of cards vanished from the collection pool, the crowd that had gathered to watch Tails was immense. Everyone watched with baited breath as the ball passed over a ten of spades. Then the ball passed over a queen of spades. The murmurs grew in intensity. The ball then passed over an ace of spades. Tails could feel sweat beading on his forehead as he guided the ball right into the next card, a jack of spades. Now the crowd's mutterings had reached a fevered pitch as the realization hit that if Tails could pick up a king of spades, he'd get a royal flush which would put him over the house score.

"Come on Tails…" whispered Sonic to himself as he watched the ball bounce around the pinball map, barely missing other cards before it finally hit the king of spades right before the ball finally fell out of play. But the damage had been done as the machine displayed the final card of Tails' last hand, his score shooting up to five trillion, one hundred billion from the royal flush poker hand he had assembled. Sirens started going off and bright lights started flashing rapidly all over the machine.

"I did it!" shouted Tails as he ripped the helmet off his head, throwing a fist up triumphantly.

"That you did, big guy!" hollered Sonic over the noise of the sirens. He then turned to the man in the suit, who had fallen to his knees in disbelief. "I believe he just won that gem, right?"

"He did…" said the man in total disbelief. Gathering himself as best he could, he walked up to Tails and extend his hand to the young fox. "Congratulations, young man. You've bested a score that the game's developers said couldn't be won for months. How'd you do it anyways?"

"Beginner's luck, I guess," was all Tails could say. The man gave a small laugh at hearing that.

"'Beginner's luck', indeed. If you'll give us a few minutes, we'll fetch your prize for you," said the man.

"I'll get it," said Tails, twirling his double tails behind him as he flew up and snatched the case from its resting place. He then flew back down next to the man. The man smiled as he reached into his pocket and withdrew a small key. He then unlocked the holding case and took the Chaos Emerald out, then handed it to Tails, who happily accepted the gem. The crowd that had gathered applauded loudly for the young fox. Suddenly, a loud crash sounded from the other end of the building and the ground shook slightly as if something had jolted it. An usher came running through the crowd a few moments later.

"Boss! That mobian that answered our fighting promotion's caused a big problem!" shouted the usher. The man in the suit's eyes lit up as the realization of what the usher was referring to hit him.

"Sorry to leave with such little notice, but there's another matter I have to attend to," said the man before he took off after the usher.

"Well, I say we go back to the hotel room for a good night's sleep. Two emeralds in one day is enough. We can look for the others tomorrow," said Sonic. Tails gave a small yawn.

"Yeah. Doesn't look like it would, but playing that game drained me pretty good," said Tails as the two started heading for the exit.

"I'll bet. I don't think I've seen you concentrate on something that hard before," said Sonic as they exited the building. Suddenly a familiar loud humming noise caught both of their ears, but before they had time to see where it was coming from, Eggman's hovercraft smashed into the two of them, knocking them both to the pavement and causing Tails to lose his grip on the Chaos Emerald.

"Oh no, the emerald!" shouted Sonic as both he and Tails flipped to their feet and started running towards it.

"Oh no you don't!" shouted Eggman as his craft flew right on top of the Chaos Emerald, then shot a blast of gas into the two mobians' faces.

"Aw geeze," cried Sonic as he breathed in the gas, Tails also unable to stop himself from doing the same thing.

"Be thankful I'm too afraid of breathing in poisonous gas by doing this, but this sleeping gas should still keep you out of my hair for the rest of the evening," said Eggman as he activated the hovercraft's tractor beam, the Chaos Emerald being whisked up into the craft. Eggman then gave a fit of laughter as he flew off into the night, leaving the two friends lying on the sidewalk.

"Egg…man…" whispered Sonic before the gas finally made him succumb to sleep.

* * *

Knuckles sat in his corner of the boxing ring that the casino had set up for the fights with the Master Emerald shard as the prize. His face was set in stone, his eyes closed as he showed no emotion to anyone that was watching him. At the far end of the ring, a muscle bound human wearing boxing gloves and shorts sat as well, his friends giving him words of encouragement.

"Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to Diamond Dust Casino's prize fight, pitting one mobian against anyone who dares to challenge him! The winner receives this beautiful gemstone as the grand prize!" said the ring announcer, holding up a rather large shard of the Master Emerald. "In this corner, weighing in at two hundred and fifty five pounds of pure muscle is our first challenger, Robert Galdhand!" said the announcer, gesturing towards the human in the ring. He then motioned towards Knuckles. "And in this corner, clocking in at a mere eighty five pounds, is our mobian fighter, Knuckles!" The crowd then began cheering loudly as the two got up from their seats and moved to the center of the ring.

"I want to be sure one more time before we start this thing up that all I have to do is make my challengers quit to win that shard, right?" asked Knuckles, looking up at the announcer.

"That is correct," said the announcer. The human in the ring laughed loudly at hearing Knuckles question.

"Ha! You won't even last the first round with me, pipsqueak," said Robert, bashing his fists together. Knuckles looked back up at the human, a smile on his face.

"Oh, I can win this without even touching you," said Knuckles.

"That's a good one, little mobian. How could you make me quit without even touching me?" asked Robert.

"Like this," said Knuckles. He then jumped straight up into the air, nearly crashing into the ceiling that was fifty feet above them. As he began to fall back towards the ground, he pulled his right fist back behind his head and went into a nosedive. Right before he hit the ground, he thrust his right fist forward, slamming it into the mat and causing the whole middle of the fighting ring to crash inward as the ring gave way to the power of Knuckles' punch. Both the announcer and challenger grabbed onto the ropes on the edge of the ring to keep themselves from falling into the middle of the now trashed fighting ring. Knuckles then leapt out of the hole in the middle of the ring and landed on the ring pole opposite of where the challenger was at. "So…Still want to go a round with me?" he asked.

"N-No way! Only a crazy person would want to mess with someone like you if you can do something like that! I'm outta here!" cried Robert, clamoring over the ropes and taking off towards the locker room. Knuckles smiled and then faced the other people who had been in line to take a shot at him.

"Anyone else want to give me a try?" asked Knuckles. The other humans at the ringside all started to disperse, most of them talking about how rigged the fight was if a mobian that was strong as Knuckles was the one to beat. Seeing that no one else wanted to take him on, Knuckles hopped off the pole and walked over to where the announcer was climbing out of the destroyed ring. "I believe I'll take my prize now."

"What on Earth happened to the ring!?" shouted the man in the suit that had given Tails the white Chaos Emerald.

"Our mobian challenger did that," said the announcer.

"Hey. I could've just as easily beaten the tar out of everyone, but I didn't want anyone to get injured by me," said Knuckles.

"That would've been their choice to fight you! That was the whole point of the match!" cried the man in the suit.

"Well, what's done it done. I want that shard right now," said Knuckles, folding his arms over his chest.

"Well, boss? Do we give it to him even though he ruined the event?" asked the announcer. The man in the suit took in a deep breath, then let out a long sigh.

"Give it to him. Technically, he did make them all quit," he said to the announcer, who took off to fetch the Master Emerald shard. The man then looked down at Knuckles. "But you're not allowed to enter this building again after pulling that stunt. Not only did we lose our virtual pinball prize tonight, but you caused our only other event to be a complete failure as well."

"Not my problem. Next time don't use us mobians as gimmicks for your little events," said Knuckles as the announcer returned with the Master Emerald shard. Knuckles took the shard from the announcer, then walked back over to the ring where the large sack of shards he had collected during the day sat. Placing the newly acquired shard into the bag, he then lugged it over his shoulder and started for the exit. But before he had taken even ten steps, a ball of pink light flew down in front of his face, startling the echidna and stopping his forward movement. "What in the world is…?" he started to say before the ball of light flew right into his face, blinding him with a flash of white light. When the light faded, Knuckles was gone.

* * *

A cool breeze greeted Knuckles as he opened his eyes, which were just now readjusting from being blasted with that bright light. But as his eyes cleared, his jaw dropped in astonishment. Gone was the casino and its colorful lights and sounds. Instead, he was now standing on the top of a spire sitting atop a large, pyramid shaped temple situated in the middle of a vast jungle. And it was no longer night, but rather the middle of the day.

"What in the world…Where the heck am I at?" asked Knuckles to himself as he gazed out over the land, seeing that there were huts scattered all over the place. _Oh, you've gotta be kidding me!_ his mind shouted to him as he realized he was no longer holding the sack with the Master Emerald shards in it. He then looked down at the ground, wondering if the sack had fallen off the spire he was standing on. It was then he saw that the mobians that were scurrying about below him were none other than echidnas. What looked to be hundreds of them were going about their daily duties. "This isn't our species last village, that's for sure. There are way too many echidnas. Plus, I know there's no temple like this one right in the middle of the village." Leaping off the spire, he glided over the bustling echidnas below him before landing on top of one of the huts.

"Hey! Can anyone tell me where I'm at?" called Knuckles to a couple of echidnas that were walking past the hut. But they completely ignored him, continuing to walk in the direction they were going without so much as looking back at him. "Well, that was rude…" he said to himself before leaping down off the hut. He began to wander about the huts, noticing that despite himself being an outsider to this place, none of the other echidnas were paying any attention to him. It was almost as if they couldn't even see him. But as he rounded the corner of another hut, he spotted a pair of echidnas arguing with each other.

One was an orange furred echidna girl that looked to be in her mid-teens. She wore a white tube top, a white skirt with green diamond patterns with a smaller red diamond in the middle of the green patterns, a pair of sandals, and each of her dreadlocks sported white cloth bands on them. The other was an older, dark red furred male echidna. He wore a red and orange checkered skirt with dark green feathers flowing off the bottom, bands on his wrists with the same feathers on them, and a necklace that also had the same kind of feathers. In his right hand was a ceremonial spear.

"Father, you can't do this!" cried the young girl.

"Tikal, you have to understand. The seven emeralds are the last hope of saving our tribe. The war will end with our destruction if we don't take them now," said the older echidna.

"But stealing and killing just to win the war can't be the right path to peace. No one has the right to take their holy ground and what rightfully belongs to them," said the girl. But the older echidna ignored her and began to walk away from the argument. "Father, I beg you! Please don't do it!"

"What war are they talking about?" asked Knuckles to himself. Suddenly, a bright light burst forth from the girl, causing Knuckles to shield his eyes from the blast.

* * *

As the light died down and Knuckles' eyes readjusted again, he realized it was night again.

"Now where am I?" he asked aloud. It was then he realized he was standing outside of the Emerald's Glow hotel, the sack with the Master Emerald shards once again strung over his shoulder. _Okay…What was that all about? Where was that place? And who were those echidnas? _he thought to himself. He then caught something out of the corner of his eye he never expected to see. Dr. Eggman was walking into the front door of the establishment.

"Eggman! What's he doing here?" asked Knuckles to himself. As the doctor entered the building, Knuckles noticed at the last second that he was holding a softly glowing object in his right hand. _Oh no! I'll bet that's a shard of the Master Emerald!_ thought Knuckles. Without a second thought, he ran over to the hotel's entrance and walked in just in time to see Eggman getting on an elevator near the far left side of the grand entranceway. Knuckles ran over to the elevator, watching to see which floor the thing would stop at. The indicator light finally stopped on the second to the top floor, labeled as the fine dining restaurant according the floor guide next to the elevator. "I doubt he's stopping by for dinner," said Knuckles to himself as he pressed the 'up' arrow on the elevator.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

Dr. Eggman looked about the restaurant in the Emerald's Glow hotel, eyeing all the people enjoying their dinners. A smile worked its way on his face as he walked towards the open area in the middle of the restaurant where a grand piano was situated, a man in a tuxedo playing a soothing song on the instrument. Suddenly, a several cries rang out from the kitchen, followed a few seconds later by the kitchen staff running out in terror, saying something about there being a monster in the kitchen. _Ah. Right on time,_ thought Eggman as he looked over at the double doors leading to the kitchen. All the guests in the restaurant were now looking in the same direction as well.

"Eggman!" shouted a voice from the elevators. Eggman turned to the source of the voice to see Knuckles standing there, his hands curled into fists, the sack with the Master Emerald shards discarded next to the elevator. Now the whole room began to panic after hearing the doctor's name being called out. Several people were pointing at him and chattering loudly at each other. "Give me back that shard of the Master Emerald right now!"

"Well, if it isn't Knuckles. Sorry to say, but I don't have a shard of your precious Master Emerald," said Eggman, holding up the white Chaos Emerald in his right hand.

"Hey! That's not a shard, that's a Chaos Emerald," said Knuckles, surprised that his guess had been wrong.

"Indeed. Still, you being here gives me an opportunity to test out Chaos' new powers," said Eggman.

"Who's Chaos?" asked Knuckles. Suddenly, the double doors leading to the kitchen slammed open as if on cue, a large globe of water flying through the doors and landing in the middle of the open area next to Eggman in a large puddle. The water quickly started to rise up and morph into a humanoid shape, finally revealing the form of Chaos, the indigo Chaos Emerald still in his right hand. Seeing the monster now in the middle of the restaurant, the patrons started screaming and making their way to the emergency exit stairwells, leaving the three of them alone in the middle of the restaurant. "It's you! The creature I saw on Floating Island!" exclaimed Knuckles.

"So you remember him, do you?" asked Eggman. "Well, you should also see that he has changed a little bit since that encounter. And now, you'll see him change once again!" Letting loose with a fit of laughter, Eggman tossed the white Chaos Emerald into Chaos' waiting left hand. Suddenly, a bright light burst forth from Chaos as his body morphed once again. Now both his arms had bones running through them and were bulked up compared to the rest of him, the white Chaos Emerald now resting in the same kind of socket that the indigo emerald was in. His two dreadlocks were now jutting out of the sides of his head like a hammerhead shark's, with a small protrusion sticking out of the back of his head.

"Changing shape won't scare me that easily," said Knuckles, taking a fighting stance. He then smiled. "And thanks doc, you saved me the trouble of tracking this thing down. Now I'll get him good."

"You've always had a confident attitude about you, just like that annoying Sonic. But confidence won't save you against the power of Chaos," said Eggman as he ran out of the middle clearing, leaving Knuckles and Chaos to square off. "Show no mercy Chaos! Crush this annoying echidna!" Chaos' body morphed into a giant ball of water and leapt forward, intent on crushing the echidna underneath his weight. But Knuckles dodged at the last second, leaping on top of the grand piano. The giant globe of water bounced towards him, but again Knuckles leapt out of the way at the last second again, the piano getting crushed by Chaos. Chaos then bounced away from Knuckles and landed on the far side of the clearing, morphing back into his humanoid form.

"Now you're mine!" shouted Knuckles, rushing at Chaos as fast as his feet would carry him. Chaos' only response was to bring both of his arms up in a shielding motion. As Knuckles reached him, he swung his right fist as hard as he could at Chaos. But just before he made contact with Chaos' body, an energy shield appeared in front of Chaos, blocking Knuckles' attack and knocking the surprised echidna away. "What in the world!?"

"Ah, so he's gained the ability to shield himself from harm! Oh, now you're in for it knucklehead," said Eggman as he watched the battle from the sidelines. The shield vanished from in front of Chaos, who then dissolved into a massive puddle that stretched across most of the floor.

"Now what's he doing?" asked Knuckles to himself as Chaos' body spread over his feet. The answer hit him a second later as Chaos electrified the water of his body using the Chaos Emeralds' power, sending thousands of volts shooting through Knuckles, the echidna crying out in pain as he collapsed onto the floor. After a few seconds of this, Chaos let up on the attack and started to reform back into his humanoid form. "Okay…That was…Unexpected…" said Knuckles as he wobbly got back to his feet. He then reset his fighting stance as Chaos waited patiently a few yards in front of him. Knuckles then charged him again, this time not letting up on his attack as Chaos raised his energy shield again by throwing both his arms in front of him. Just like before, the echidna's attacks were being reflected harmlessly off the shield. Knuckles then let up on the attack, realizing he was getting nowhere fast. Chaos lowered his arms again, the shield disappearing once more. Then a thought crossed Knuckles' mind. _Maybe that's how to go about beating him,_ he thought to himself.

"Face it Knuckles. Chaos is more than you can handle," laughed Eggman as he watched the echidna stop his attacks.

"I'm betting not," said Knuckles. He then smiled and slapped his chest. "Come on Chaos. Give me your best shot!" Chaos lowered his body in a crouching position, then flung his left arm out at Knuckles, the limb extending rapidly towards the echidna. Knuckles smiled as at the last second, he dodged to the left and then leapt forward as fast as he could. As soon as he had closed the gap between the two, he swung with all his might at Chaos' head. Unlike the previous times he had attacked, Chaos didn't have both of his arms up in a shielding gesture. And sure enough, the energy shield did not appear this time as Knuckles' fist slammed hard into Chaos' head, striking his brain resting within. Chaos' body instantly fell apart, splashing all over the floor.

"Oh no! Chaos!" cried Eggman, seeing the creature felled by Knuckles' attack.

"Just as I thought," said Knuckles with a smile as Chaos' body gathered back together and morphed back into his humanoid form. "You can't shield yourself whenever you attack me, which means I've won this fight!"

"Enough Chaos…Let him have this one," said Eggman, calling the creature off. Chaos looked over at Eggman for a few seconds, then morphed back into a puddle before splashing his way into the kitchen and going down one of the sink drains. Eggman watched Chaos leave, then turned towards Knuckles. "Consider yourself lucky that I've only found two emeralds so far. If he had more, then you wouldn't have stood a chance."

"Believe what you want Eggman. He'll still lose to me the same," said Knuckles.

"As you said, believe what you want," said Eggman. He then smiled. "Still, it's interesting to note that you thought I had a shard of your Master Emerald. While I'm not interested in finding it at the moment, I know someone else who is." Hearing this caught Knuckles attention.

"Who else is looking for them?" asked Knuckles.

"Sonic is looking for them," said Eggman.

"Sonic's here?" asked Knuckles. Then he narrowed his eyes as a thought passed through his mind. "Even if he is, why is he looking for the Master Emerald shards?"

"To beat Chaos, of course. He knows that without the Master Emerald's power, he won't stand a chance at stopping Chaos once he's complete. In fact, I'm willing to bet he's found a few pieces of it by now," said Eggman. Knuckles gritted his teeth at hearing this proclamation.

"Sonic…He knows that the Master Emerald is only supposed to be used by me," said Knuckles to himself, his anger with Sonic that had nearly been wiped out by time now reignited again after hearing what Eggman had said.

"Well, it's been fun Knuckles, but I really must be going now. Places to go, Chaos Emeralds to find," said Eggman as he walked over to emergency stairwell exit and left the restaurant, leaving a now seething Knuckles behind to think over what Eggman had said.

"If what Eggman says is true, then I need to find Sonic and get back any shards he has," said Knuckles as he started walking towards the elevator.

* * *

As the morning sun began to rise in the east, Sonic and Tails slowly started to wake up, the effects of Eggman's gas finally wearing off. A few people were walking along the sidewalk, eyeing the sleeping mobians, one man calling them bums as he passed by.

"Oh man…What happened Sonic?" asked Tails as he sat up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

"That Eggman…Pulling a cheap stunt like that," said Sonic under his breath as he got into a seated position.

"Oh no! Where's the Chaos Emerald!?" cried Tails in alarm, realizing the white gem was now gone.

"Eggman got it. At least the other one's safe back at the airport, or at least I hope it is," said Sonic.

"That's not good. Now he has two to our one," said Tails.

"I know. I'm betting he has a way to track where the emeralds are at. Or else he got lucky waiting for us to leave the casino and jumping us like he did," said Sonic. He then stood up and offered a hand to Tails, who grasped it as the blue hedgehog pulled the fox to his feet. "Either way, I'm not taking any chances that he can track them now. We're going back to the airport and getting the Chaos Emerald from there. It'll be safer if we keep it with us."

"Hey Sonic! Look at the poster on the side of the cab!" cried Tails, pointing at a cab that had pulled over to pick up a businessman. Sonic dashed over and started reading it. It pictured the snowy Icecap mountain range to the north of the city with a guy on a snowboard going down an impossibly steep mountain side proclaiming that there was a snowboarding competition taking place that same day at noon. But what really caught the two mobians' attention was the first prize award. It pictured a large, brilliant cut green gem. Sonic barely had enough time to read which of the mountains the competition was taking place at before the cab took off.

"Well, guess we now know where the green Chaos Emerald is at. Where did they find all of them to use as prizes anyways?" asked Sonic.

"You got me, but you can count me out of getting this one, Sonic. Playing a machine is one thing, but I have no idea how to snowboard," said Tails. Sonic just smiled.

"Well, I've never done it either, but how hard could it be?" said Sonic as the two started walking in the direction of the Central Station building.

"Wouldn't it just be easier to explain our case to whoever's in charge and get it that way?" asked Tails. Sonic just smiled at the question.

"Maybe, but I want to have some fun getting this one, and there's no fun in just asking for it, is there?" said Sonic. Tails just smiled and shook his head.

* * *

The Icecap mountain range, named so because all the mountains on the range were always covered in snow, stretched for miles east to west. As Sonic and Tails arrived at the foot of one of the mountains, they saw that there were hundreds of spectators gathered together to watch the event.

"I don't think I've seen this many humans gathered in one place before," said Tails.

"Same here, big guy," said Sonic. Draped over his shoulders was a small backpack that held the violet Chaos Emerald, the gem having been retrieved from the airport before they had made their way north to the mountain range. He then looked down at Tails. "Think you can find the registration booth for me?" Tails smiled as he took to the air, looking over the crowd of people till he spotted the booth off to the left of the crowd. He motioned the direction to Sonic, who gave a thumbs up and started walking in the direction of the booth. As he reached the booth, a man with short cut brown hair dressed in a black winter coat and snow pants that was seated behind the booth looked up from the magazine he was reading.

"Ah wonderful. I was wondering if any of the mobian citizens were going to enter today or not," said the man, extending his right hand towards Sonic as Tails landed next to him. "My name is Tony Helix, the top ranked human snowboarder on the southern continent."

"Nice to meet you Tony. The name's Sonic," said Sonic, grasping the man's hand and giving it a shake.

"The pleasure is all mine. I've always wanted to see what you mobians can do on a snowboard. Sadly, I've not seen many of your kind take up the sport over the few years I've lived here," said Tony.

"Well, I've never tried it, but I'm willing to give it a shot," said Sonic.

"That's the right attitude to have," said Tony, a smile spreading over his face. He then looked over at Tails. "And are you entering as well?"

"Nah. I think I'll leave this one up to Sonic," said Tails.

"Well, I'm sure you're aware of our first place prize," said Tony. He then motioned off to the left where a giant trophy was sitting on a table setting on a stage platform. The trophy was topped by a guy snowboarding. But it was what was sitting in front of the trophy that caught the two mobians' eyes. Resting next to the trophy was the green Chaos Emerald.

"That we are. That's the only reason we're here after all," said Sonic.

"Well, in that case, I wish you the best of luck. Just take the gondola up to the top of the peak where the other competitors are at," said Tony, handing Sonic a blue snowboard. "Normally we advise people to wear safety equipment, but I've seen how tough you mobians are. I don't think you'll need any."

"So take the gondola to the top?" asked Sonic, looking over at where the transport was stationed. He then closed his eyes and shook his head. "Too slow for my tastes. I'll get up there myself." With that, Sonic shot from his spot and started racing up the side of the mountain towards the top.

"My word he's fast!" exclaimed Tony as he and several other people were watching Sonic scale the side of the mountain with ease.

"You'll see no one faster," said Tails with a smile. He then twisted his double tails together and took to the air. "I'm gonna catch the bird's eye view of this."

Near the top of the peak, several humans dressed up in snowboarding gear waited for the start of the competition, each one doing their own thing to prepare. Suddenly, the relative calm of the peak was shattered as a sonic boom sounded, announcing the arrival of Sonic. Everyone all nervously looked up towards the top of the peak, but as the seconds ticked by and nothing happened, they all breathed a sigh of relief. They all then turned angry glares at Sonic.

"What?" asked Sonic, setting his snowboard into the snowy ground.

"That loud shockwave might've started an avalanche, that's what mobian," said a young girl.

"Yeah, that's right," said another girl.

"Sorry. I didn't know," said Sonic. The humans all muttered a few more words under their breath, then returned to what they were doing. Sonic glanced down at his watch, the time reading two minutes till noon.

"May I have your attention please everyone," said a woman dressed in winter coat and snow pants with a judge tag sown across the right breast of the winter coat. "The fifth annual Icecap Snowboarding competition is about to begin. As most of you are returning participants, you are already aware of the rules. But for those of you who are first timers, I will explain them for you. You will be judged on how fast you can make it down the mountain, as well as for any mid-air tricks you can pull off on the jumps we have set up along the course. The more difficult the trick, the more points you score. The winner will be determined after everyone has had their turn. Any questions?"

"I got one," said Sonic, causing everyone to look back at him. "Is it alright if I go last, so I can watch these people go and get a feel for how to do this?" At hearing this statement, most of the people there started laughing lightly to themselves.

"If you wish, you can do that," said the judge. "Now then, let's get the first person up to the starting line and get this competition underway." The girl that had first said something to Sonic about the avalanche possibility was up first. Sonic walked over to the edge of the cliff to watch as the girl made her attempt. He saw how she balanced on the board, and how she made sure to land properly off the first jump after she did a three sixty twirl in the air.

"Oh, this is gonna be a breeze," said Sonic to himself as the girl finally vanished from his view. One by one, the other human competitors took their turns, Sonic watching each one carefully for as long as he could keep them in his line of sight.

* * *

In Dr. Eggman's hidden underground base deep in the jungles that were to the south of Emerald City, the doctor was putting the finishing touches on his latest robotic creation. The robot stood three meters tall with its chest painted red with a vertical white stripe going right through the middle of the red paint, a floodlight located on its lower left chest. Two exhaust pipes wrapped around its mid-section, with the ends facing away from its back. On the bottom right of its chest painted in white was the insignia "E-102". Instead of a hand at the end of its right arm, a large laser cannon was in its place. Its head was a smooth block shape with a yellow top and completely black front with two green lights for eyes. On the back of each of its black feet was a small wheel.

"And now for the final touch," said Eggman. He then walked over to a table where four different colored Flicky birds sat inside of small force field containers, each one squawking to be let out, but the force field letting no sound come out. Picking the container with the purple Flicky bird in it, he walked back over to where the robot stood. Opening a panel on its back, the doctor placed the container in a slot located inside the robot, then closed the panel. Walking back in front of the robot, he then smiled.

"Time to wake up, E-102," said Eggman as he reached up and pressed a small button on its chest. A few seconds ticked by, then the robot suddenly shot to attention, its eyes lighting up. "Excellent! Seems that using the Flickies as a power source wasn't a fluke with E-101 after all." The robot looked down at Eggman, but made no other movements. "Take a good look at me, for I am your brilliant creator, Dr. Eggman. You are the second in my new E-100 series robots, E-102, codenamed Gamma. You have been programmed to obey only me, and I expect that to always be the case."

"Yes, doctor," said Gamma. Eggman smiled at hearing this. He then turned and started walking towards the far end of the room, Gamma following close behind.

"Your first test to see if you are worth keeping is to see if you can hold your own in a battle. To that end, I've decided to pit you against your older brother, E-101 Beta. He might be more advanced than you are, and I might be placing my bets on him, but I owe you at least a fighting chance to see if you can overcome my expectations," said Eggman. He then motioned to the door. "Beta is through here. Fight well, Gamma, for your continued existence depends on it."

"Yes, doctor," said Gamma, walking up to the door as it opened up, revealing a large open room. Gamma entered the room, Eggman following right behind him. Standing at the far end of the room was another robot similar looking to Gamma. The only real differences was that the red was painted black on the robot, the insignia read "E-101", and instead of just one hand being a laser cannon, both were cannons.

"Alright you two. Give me a good performance and show me which one of you two is worthy to serve under my command aboard the Egg Carrier," said Eggman. Both robots then squared up towards one another. Beta was the first to make a move, quickly aiming both his cannons at Gamma, who also aimed his weapon at Beta in response. Beta fired both his cannons first, but Gamma dodged to the left causing both shots to go wide. He then fired a shot from his own cannon, which was also evaded by Beta. The two exchanged more shots, each of them coming closer to their mark each time.

"Oh this is even better than I expected," said Eggman, watching the fight with glee. As Gamma was nearly missed by another round of fire from Beta, he scrunched his body close to the ground and activated the wheels on the backs of his feet. He then shot forward, closing the gap between the two combatants rapidly. Beta fired off a few more shots as Gamma closed in, but Gamma whizzed out of the way of each of them. As he finally reached Beta, he fired his cannon at Beta's chest. At point blank range, Beta had no time to react to the shot as the laser blast caught him in the lower left chest, blowing the floodlight off his body. Beta aimed both his cannons at Gamma, ready to repay the damage in kind.

"Enough!" shouted Eggman, causing both robots to halt their actions. They each retreated to the far ends of the room. "I've seen what I needed to see." He then walked over to Gamma. "I really didn't think you had it in you to cause damage to Beta first, but you've surprised me Gamma. As such, I declare you the winner, and give you permission to server aboard the Egg Carrier." Beta practically ran over to the two of them, nearly bowling Gamma over as he pushed his way between the two of them. "So, you want to come along too, eh? Well, I guess I could always use the spare parts, so I'll grant you special permission to come along as well. Both of you get aboard the Egg Carrier. Now that I know which design is superior, I'll be able to finish the other E-100 series in a matter of hours. Now, both of you, get out of my sight! It's about time to get the next two Chaos Emeralds from Sonic!"

"Yes, doctor," said both of the robots, turning and walking out the door.

* * *

An hour later found Sonic still waiting for his turn at the top of the Icecap mountain peak. He had grown bored watching the human competitors, being confident he had learned enough from watching the first couple dozen do their runs. Now, it had been a couple minutes since the last human other than the judge had taken off down the mountain.

"And that brings us to you, sir," said the judge to Sonic. The blue hedgehog smiled as he placed the snowboard at the edge of the cliff facing and then buckled his feet onto the board. Suddenly, a very faint whine coming from above and to the front of him caught his sensitive ear. His smile fading in an instant, he looked up towards the sky where the noise was coming from.

"Is something wrong, sir?" asked the judge. Sonic paid her no mind as his eyes kept scanning the skyline. Just as he was about to dismiss the noise, he spotted a purple object flying towards the mountain range, having just appeared from behind a cloud.

"This is supposed to be a no-fly zone, right?" asked Sonic, looking back at the judge, who gave him a curious look.

"For today, that's true. Why do you ask?" asked the judge. Sonic gritted his teeth as the object came flying towards the top of the mountain at a high speed.

"Cause I think we've got company," said Sonic. The object finally got close enough to see it clearly, revealing itself to be a large, bird-like robot. As the robot flew by overhead, it dropped an object out of a hatch on its underside. Sonic and the judge watched as the object that the robot had released landed in the snow bank a little ways up the side of the mountain. Without warning, a fairly good sized explosion erupted from where the object had landed, Sonic realizing all too late that the robot had dropped a bomb into the snow. "Come over here fast!" shouted Sonic, the woman running over to him as fast as her feet would carry her in the snow as the snow bank above their heads gave way from the chain reaction of the explosion. Sonic scooped the woman up in his arms, then leapt off the edge of the cliff and started down the mountain side, an avalanche of snow following the two of them from behind. Sonic maneuvered the board as best he could around trees and rock outcroppings, managing to stay one step ahead of the blanket of snow that was chasing them down the mountainside, all the while the female judge screaming out in terror at the top of her lungs.

"Oh man, this is not good," said Sonic as they reached the first major ramp that had been set up along the snowboarding course. However, there was good news in the fact that the ramp would send them over a small canyon about five feet across. If they could make it past that point, then the avalanche should be stopped by the drop off. "Hold on tight!" The woman wrapped her arms around the cerulean hedgehog as tight as she could as they flew off the ramp. The pair flew through the air nearly thirty feet before the board landed hard on the snow below them, Sonic barely managing to keep them both upright. Sonic dared a glance over his shoulder to see that the avalanche had indeed stopped chasing them.

A smile worked its way across his face as he looked forward again, but the smile faded as fast as it had appeared as Sonic saw several smaller robots whiz by overhead, dropping more bombs at him as the hedgehog maneuvered the snowboard around the blasts. As soon as the pair past by the last of the bombs, Sonic looked back over his shoulder to see that the robots weren't making a second pass. Sonic looked forward again just in time to see the final ramp before the finish, the smile returning to his face. As the pair launched off the ramp, Sonic sent the snowboard into a dizzying spin, doing multiple rotations till the board finally hit the snow again, Sonic leveling them out perfectly. As they skidded past the finish line and came to a stop, people started rushing up to help the pair, asking them if they were alright. The woman shakily got out of Sonic's arms and was rushed over to a waiting ambulance to be checked out. Sonic declined the same treatment, but he did follow the woman over to the emergency vehicle.

"Hey. You alright?" he asked her. The woman looked shaken to the core, but she still managed a smile.

"Yeah…I'll be okay. Thanks for saving my life, um…" she said, suddenly realizing she didn't know the name of her savior.

"Sonic. And you are?" asked Sonic, extending his hand to her.

"I'm April," she said, taking Sonic's hand and shaking it.

"Sonic! Is everything okay!?" hollered Tails voice, causing both of them to look up to see the young fox running towards them, Tony not far behind.

"We're alright!" called Sonic back to Tails.

"That was incredible!" shouted Tony as he and Tails reached the pair. "I've never seen anything like that before. How'd you handle yourself going down that course with someone in your arms!?"

"I kept a cool head. And it didn't hurt that I picked up on how to handle a snowboard from watching the other competitors do it," said Sonic.

"I see," said Tony, who then looked over at April. "How about you April? You doing okay?" April just nodded.

"Yeah. Little shaken, but I'll be okay," said April. She then smiled. "I think we all know who deserves that first place award now, don't we?" Tony returned the smile.

"Yeah. No doubt in my mind who it should go to," he said. He then motioned for Sonic and Tails to follow him, the two of them taking off after him to leave April sitting in the ambulance to recover.

"So you think that was Eggman that set off the avalanche?" asked Tails as he walked beside Sonic.

"No doubt in my mind, little bro," said Sonic as they reached the stage where the trophy sat. He then looked over at Tails. "Still, if that was him, it was a lousy try. The first robot caused a problem, sure, but those other ones were off by miles as far as their aim goes."

"Well, the first one being successful was bad enough if you ask me," said Tails.

"No argument here," said Sonic. By now, Tony had made his way to center stage and picked a microphone up off the table the trophy was sitting on.

"Well, today's seen many snowboarders show off amazing tricks and talent. I'd like to congratulate you all on your outstanding performances," said Tony, the gathered masses cheering and applauding. "However, only one of you can claim this year's first prize." At this, he held up the green Chaos Emerald in his left hand. "And after what we just witnessed on the final run of the day, I can think of no other person that deserves it more than the hero of the day. Come on up here, Sonic!" The crowd erupted in another round of cheering and applause as Sonic leapt up onto the stage and walked up next to Tony, who extended the Chaos Emerald towards him.

"Thanks Tony," said Sonic as he took the emerald from the human's hand.

"No. Thank you Sonic. You gave us all a day to remember for a long time to come with your heroic act," said Tony. "We'll send the trophy to wherever you want."

"Nah. You guys can keep it for next year. This is all I came for," said Sonic, gesturing to the emerald.

"If you say so," said Tony with a small laugh. He then looked out into the crowd. "Let's hear it once more for Sonic!" The crowd answered in kind with another generous round of cheers and applause. Sonic waved a few times to the crowd, then hopped down off the stage next to Tails.

"Alright, big guy. Let's get back to the airport and plan our next move," said Sonic as he placed the green Chaos Emerald into the backpack.

"Sounds good to me," said Tails.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

Knuckles sat at the edge of a small lake that was not far away from the mesa where the Mystic Ruins Airport was sitting atop. The sun had begun to set in the west, the sky turning a bright orange in color. Many thoughts had been going through the echidna's mind as he stared into the clear blue water of the pond, the chief of which was how mad he was with Sonic. Eggman's statement that Sonic was after the shards of the Master Emerald made sense in Knuckles' mind. If Chaos were to gain more power by absorbing more Chaos Emeralds, the Master Emerald's power might be the only thing that could stop him. But despite the fact that if Sonic was truly hunting down shards to stop Chaos, Knuckles couldn't get past the fact that Sonic hadn't even asked him if he could be allowed to use its power. He had told Sonic that the guardian of the Master Emerald was the only one permitted to use its power unless special permission from said guardian was given to another person. This was what had angered Knuckles more than anything.

The sound of someone talking snapped him to attention. He recognized the voice talking as belonging to Tails. _So that human named Tom was right. They did show up as he said they would,_ thought Knuckles. He quickly moved onto the path leading towards the airport, Sonic and Tails rounding the corner of the path just a few seconds later. Sonic was holding a softly glowing green object in his right hand. Just seeing the blue hedgehog with what looked to be a shard of the Master Emerald made Knuckles blood boil. He watched as the two mobians finally took notice of him and stopped walking in his direction. At this point, they were about ten yards away from him.

"Hey Knuckles! Long time no see," said Tails.

"I'm only gonna say this once. Stay out of this Tails," said Knuckles. He then charged Sonic, pulling back his left fist to deliver a powerful blow to Sonic. But Sonic flipped up high and backwards as Knuckles fist collided with the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust and making a small indentation in the ground.

"Nice to see you too, Knux," said Sonic as he landed twenty yards away from Knuckles. He then slipped the glowing green object back into the backpack on his back.

"This isn't a social call, hedgehog. Give that shard back this instant and I might let you walk away," said Knuckles, his teeth gritted in anger.

"What 'shard' are you talking about?" asked Sonic, genuinely confused by Knuckles request.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about!" shouted Knuckles as he charged Sonic again. But as the echidna lunged at Sonic again, the hedgehog once more jumped out of the way. But this time Knuckles was quick on the draw and leapt up at Sonic, this time connecting with a solid punch as he sent Sonic flying several yards away from him. Sonic landed hard on his back, letting out a small grunt of pain. His wondering giving way to annoyance, Sonic flipped back onto his feet and stared down the crimson echidna.

"Okay…Obviously words aren't going to get us anywhere. So I guess I'll just have to force you to back down and listen to me," said Sonic.

"Sonic don't!" shouted Tails. Sonic just raised a hand towards Tails.

"It's alright Tails. If Knuckles wants a fight, I'll give him a fight," said Sonic. He then shot from his spot towards Knuckles, instantly covering the distance between the two in a micro second as he threw his own punch at Knuckles who was unable to raise a defense fast enough to stop Sonic's attack. Knuckles staggered backwards, holding his hand over the now sore spot where Sonic's punch had landed as Sonic raced away from Knuckles, coming to a stop about thirty yards away from him.

"You just made a big mistake Sonic," said Knuckles. He then charged towards Sonic again. But this time, Sonic charged Knuckles as well. As the two finally closed the distance between them, Knuckles swung first, causing Sonic to sidestep to avoid the attack. But Knuckles had anticipated the move and swung his other fist at Sonic's side. This attack hit home, knocking Sonic head over heels and sending him flying to the ground next to the lake. But when Sonic hit the ground this time, the backpack opened up and the two Chaos Emeralds inside were ejected, the pair of emeralds bouncing across the ground to come to rest near the jungle foliage. Suddenly, a very familiar fit of laughter erupted from above the tree line just before Eggman's hovercraft flew out from its hiding spot above the jungle. Flying the craft right above the Chaos Emeralds, he used the craft's tractor beam to draw the gems into the craft.

"Oh no, Eggman!" cried Tails, running over to Knuckles' side.

"Oh you guys are too easy!" cried Eggman as he retrieved the emeralds from his craft.

"Oh great…" said Sonic as he slowly rose to his feet, still recovering from the blow Knuckles had delivered to him. Knuckles also looked over at the doctor, eyeing the green gem now held in his left hands.

"Hey! That's a Chaos Emeralds," said Knuckles.

"Indeed it is, you idiotic echidna. And I couldn't have gotten these two without your help," said Eggman. By now, Sonic had gotten back to his feet and had run up next to Knuckles and Tails.

"Please don't tell me you let Eggman trick you again!? Didn't you learn your lesson the first time Knuckles?" asked Sonic, looking over at Knuckles. The echidna glanced over at Sonic, wanting to say something, but words escaping him as he realized he had fallen for Eggman's trick to turn him against Sonic again.

"Now I have four of the Chaos Emeralds! Come on out of hiding Chaos! I've got a snack for you!" shouted Eggman. Suddenly, a large amount of water erupted forth from the small lake, landing in a puddle next to Eggman's hovercraft. The water then rose up and morphed into Chaos. "These are for you, my friend!" said Eggman as he threw the two Chaos Emeralds into Chaos' waiting hands. The three mobians could only watch in silence as a burst of light exploded from Chaos' body. As the light died down, Chaos' body had once again transformed. Gone was its humanoid look, it being replaced by a body that looked more akin to that of a shark with arms as it hovered in the air. The two new Chaos Emeralds in its body were now set in sockets near the base of its tail.

"He transformed again!" cried Tails.

"And he looks even uglier to me," said Sonic.

"Mock him all you want to Sonic, but I'm willing to bet you can't stand up to his power now. And if you can't stop him or choose not to try, I'll set him loose on the city and watch as he lays waste to it," said Eggman with glee as he looked upon Chaos' new form. Chaos flipped backwards into the small lake, his body melding with the water, making it nearly impossible to tell where he was at.

"If you think we're backing down now, you got another thing coming Eggman," said Sonic before he leapt out onto one of the dozens of giant lily pads that dotted the small lake, Tails following after him from the air. Sonic watched Chaos as he circled about in the water, only able to tell where Chaos was at due to the colors of the emeralds shining through the water.

Suddenly, Chaos' body broke apart, each of the emeralds becoming the center of globes of water that shot out of the water towards Sonic. Sonic waited till the last second, then leapt to a new lily pad as he avoided Chaos' attempt to knock him into the water, Sonic leaping from lily pad to lily pad as he dodged the other orbs of water. The emeralds then gathered back together as Chaos reformed his body. Chaos then rose out of the watery depths and swung his arm towards the lily pad Sonic was standing on, a wave of orange chaos energy being projected from his arm.

"Is that the best you can do?" asked Sonic as he leapt above the blast. But to Sonic's surprise, Chaos raced underneath the lily pad he was aiming to land on. Suddenly, the lily pad sank into the lake as Chaos pulled it down underneath the water. _Oh not good! _thought Sonic as he plummeted towards the water below. But before he hit the water, a hand grasped onto his arm and stopped his fall. "Thanks for the save," said Sonic, looking up at Tails.

"Don't mention it," said Tails. Sonic looked back down at the lake, spotting the four emeralds glow in the water.

"Drop me onto that lily pad over there," said Sonic, pointing to one that was sitting right in front of where Chaos was at.

"You sure?" asked Tails, sounding unsure that doing so was a wise idea.

"Positive," said Sonic. Tails flew over the lily pad Sonic had indicated, then let go as the cerulean hedgehog dropped onto it. "Come on Chaos. I'm right here." Chaos rose out of the water, intent of launching another wave of chaos energy at Sonic. But this time, Sonic was ready as he shot straight forward, a sonic boom sounding as he instantly broke the sound barrier with a micro burst of speed, curling into a spindash. Chaos had barely started to raise his arm back to initiate the attack when Sonic plowed through his head, Chaos' body bursting apart in a spray of water as Sonic landed on another lily pad just behind Chaos.

"You got lucky you little pincushion!" shouted Eggman from his vantage point. "Chaos! Drag that spiny blue pest into the depths with you!" Chaos swam directly underneath the lily pad Sonic was standing on, the creature pulling it underwater like he had before as Sonic leapt to a new lily pad further out on the lake. Chaos started chasing after Sonic, pulling the lily pads under the water one by one as Sonic lead him around the lake. But as Sonic leapt towards a new lily pad, Chaos rose out of the water instead of pulling the lily pad down and raised his arm back to send another wave of energy that would hit Sonic at the same time he'd land. Sonic glanced over his shoulder and noticed this at the same time, realizing that his race about the lake had left him a good distance away from Tails, who would be unable to catch him this time. Suddenly, Chaos' body burst apart as a gloved fist was thrust through the back of his head. Sonic landed on the lily pad and looked back at his savior, a smile working its way onto his face.

"Couldn't let you two have all the fun, could I?" asked Knuckles from his spot on the lily pad right behind where Chaos had risen out of the water.

"Sure. There's plenty to share," said Sonic. By now, the lily pads had risen back up from where Chaos had pulled them under. Sonic hopped out to the same lily pad Knuckles was on, the two of them facing with their backs to each other. But as they looked around, neither of them could spot the glow of the four emeralds in the water. Suddenly realizing why they couldn't find Chaos, the two of them jumped off the lily pad just before it was dragged underwater by Chaos, who immediately rose out of the water and took aim at Sonic. But Chaos had no time to attack as a pair of orange tails slammed hard onto his head, his body once again bursting apart as this time Tails delivered a hard attack to Chaos, Sonic and Knuckles landing on separate lily pads. Suddenly, Chaos' body sprung from the lake and landed next to Eggman's hovercraft in a giant puddle of water. Seeing this, Sonic looked up at Eggman with a smile on his face.

"Face it Eggman. Even with four Chaos Emeralds, Chaos still can't hold his own against the three of us and he knows it," said Sonic. Eggman's face had twisted into one of pure rage at seeing Chaos be beaten yet again. As Sonic and Knuckles made their way back to shore, the sky suddenly grew dark, a loud humming noise echoing from above them. The three mobians all looked up into the sky to see a giant floating red airship suspended above the jungle. It was easily a kilometer long, bristling with laser cannons.

"What in the world is that thing!?" cried Knuckles.

"That, echidna, is my floating fortress, the Egg Carrier! My bastion of power over the skies of Mobius!" shouted Eggman, laughing as the three mobians gazed in awe at the ship. "But still, its power pales in comparison to Chaos' true strength. Till next we meet!" Eggman's hovercraft then took off towards the ship, a tractor beam locking onto the giant puddle that was Chaos and dragging him up into the waiting ship. The ship then started to slowly take off in the direction of Emerald City.

"Tails. Is the Tornado ready to roll?" asked Sonic, looking over at the two tailed fox.

"Not yet. I took its engine apart, remember? It'll take me hours to get it flying again," said Tails.

"Not good. We can't let Eggman escape again. Otherwise he might find even more Chaos Emeralds, and next time we might not be able to stand up to Chaos if that happens," said Sonic.

"Well, it's not ideal, but we could take the other one of Tom's bi-planes after it," suggested Tails.

"You're right. Not ideal, but we can't be picky at a time like this. Go back to the airport and get it ready to go," said Sonic, Tails giving a nod before flying off towards the mesa in the distance. Sonic looked over at Knuckles, who in turn looked back at him.

"Listen Sonic, I…" started Knuckles before Sonic raised a hand and stopped the echidna midsentence.

"It's alright Knuckles. By what you said, I'm guessing something happened to the Master Emerald?" asked Sonic. Knuckles just nodded in response. "I know how much it means to you to protect it. I had the green Chaos Emerald, and to you it probably looked like I had a piece of the Master Emerald. We all make mistakes. And for what it's worth, I'm sorry about what I said to you that day when we arrived back from Angel's timeline." A smile worked its way across the echidna's face at hearing that.

"That's all I wanted to hear from you. An apology," said Knuckles. Sonic smiled at hearing Knuckles' response.

"So…we cool then?" asked Sonic.

"Frosty," said Knuckles.

"Good. When this whole problem with Eggman's resolved, Tails and I'll help you look for those shards if you still need the help by then," said Sonic.

"Thanks. Hopefully I'll have found them all by then, but the help would be appreciated if I'm still looking," said Knuckles. He then motioned with a thumb towards the airport. "You'd better get going."

"Yeah. See you later Knuckles," said Sonic before he took off towards the mesa, leaving Knuckles behind. As the echidna watched him leave, he walked back over to the edge of the lake where the sack with the Master Emerald shards was resting. Slinging the sack over his shoulder, he closed his eyes and started to reach out with his senses, trying to discern if there were any shards nearby. As he did this, he couldn't help but think that he should've tried doing this whenever he had seen Sonic coming. If he'd not been able to feel the Master Emerald's presence coming off of Sonic, then the whole fight might have been avoided and Eggman wouldn't have gained another pair of Chaos Emeralds. Finally after about ten seconds of searching, he felt faint flickers of the Master Emerald's power radiating from further into the jungle.

"Well, guess it's into the wilderness for me," said Knuckles to himself before he started walking down the path leading further into the jungle.

* * *

"So that was seriously Dr. Eggman's ship that just flew by overhead?" asked Tom as Tails sat in the pilot's seat of the red bi-plane, going over the startup procedures as fast as he could.

"Sure was. I just hope this plane's fast enough to catch up to it," said Tails.

"You're crazy if you think this thing's gonna last five seconds against that ship. Didn't you see all the weapons on it?" asked Tom, his astonishment that Tails was even thinking of taking the old bi-plane after the Egg Carrier not lost on the two tailed fox.

"It'll be alright," said Sonic as he ran into the hanger.

"Well, I'm not going to stop you two. But be as careful as you can be," said Tom.

"We will," said Tails as he started the bi-plane's engine, the propeller springing to life as Tails started to guide the plane out of the hanger. As soon as the wings had cleared the hanger, Sonic jumped up on top of them.

"I can still see the Egg Carrier off in the distance. Looks like Eggman's not in a big hurry to make an exit. If we hurry, we should be able to catch it," said Sonic, pointing to the shrinking shape of the giant airship as it headed towards Emerald City.

"Alright! All indicators are in the green and we're ready for takeoff," said Tails before revving up the power of the engine, the plane starting to take off down the runway. "Here we go!" By now, the plane was racing down the runway, taking off just before it hit the end. As the plane leveled out over the jungle, Tails opened the plane's throttle up all the way, the plane accelerating as it took off after the Egg Carrier. Sonic's observation that the Egg Carrier wasn't in any rush to leave the airspace was dead on as the small bi-plane started to rapidly gain ground on the massive red airship.

"Fly in low. I didn't see that many cannons on the underside. We'll pass by underneath it and approach it from the front. Hopefully there's somewhere we can land on that thing," shouted Sonic over the wind.

"Got it," hollered Tails in response.

* * *

Eggman sat at the helm of the Egg Carrier, his attitude one of annoyance as he watched the clouds lazily float by the viewing windows. _How could those little pipsqueaks defeat Chaos so easily even after he had four Chaos Emeralds…_thought Eggman. _Could the tale of Chaos' power have been exaggerated by the echidnas?_ As he sat there pondering this thought, a small indicator light lit up on the main console. At first, Eggman didn't notice the blinking light, but after nearly a minute, it finally caught his eye.

"Well, seems like we're being tailed by something," said Eggman as he punched a couple commands into the arm of his command chair, a small view screen dropping from the ceiling of the room. The screen lit up, showing a very small object on its screen. Pressing a few buttons, the view zoomed in, revealing the object to be a red bi-plane. But what really caught his attention was the person standing on its wings. "So, that hedgehog decided to tail my ship, did he?" A smile worked its way across his face as he thought of how to handle the situation.

* * *

On one of the countless sidewalks along the city streets of Emerald City walked a lone pink furred hedgehog girl. She was in her early teens, wore a bright red dress, and had a red headband on top of her hair. Around her neck was a necklace with a small red and yellow hammer pendant on the end of it. In her hands was a grocery bag full of food she had just purchased. As she rounded the corner of a street, she stopped in her tracks, looking down at the ground with a sigh.

"Every day it's the same old thing," said Amy Rose to herself as she looked at the ground. "Same old place doing the same old thing. I miss living in Knothole. At least living there wasn't so boring, especially with Sonic around." Amy thought back to that time three years ago whenever her village on the northern continent had come under attack by Eggman's forces. Everything had looked dire till Sonic had arrived on the scene. He had been passing through the area, returning from a Freedom Fighter conference, and had seen the commotion coming from the small village.

In no time at all, he had driven off Eggman's robots, but the village had been unsalvageable by that point. Thankfully Eggman had wanted to capture the villagers to roboticize, so they were largely unharmed. Sonic had offered to lead the small village of about fifty mobians to Knothole to live until they could find a new home. Many of the villagers had turned him down, saying they didn't want to get caught up in the fighting. Amy's family had been one of the few to accept Sonic's offer, following him back to Knothole where they had lived for a few months till they decided to leave the war behind and make a new home in Emerald City. But Amy had never let go of the crush she had on the blue hedgehog that had saved the lives of her village that day. Even to this day she was hoping to see him again, if for no other reason other than to just talk with him. As she stood there lost in her memories, the sky suddenly turned dark, breaking Amy from her daydreaming.

"That's odd. The weather guy didn't forecast any storms today," said Amy to herself. She then looked up into the sky, her mouth suddenly dropping wide open and the bag of groceries instantly being dropped from her arms. Flying over the city was a massive red airship, a small red object hugging its underbelly. _Oh no! Could that ship belong to Eggman?_ thought Amy as she watched the ship pass by overhead. Turning her attention back in front of her, she looked down just in time to see a small blue object headed right at her head. Unable to get out of the way in time, the object crashed into Amy's head, knocking the girl to the ground. "Ouch! What was that thing?" she cried. She looked off to her side to see a small blue Flicky bird with a large locket around its neck resting on the ground next to her, knocked senseless from its collision with Amy. Realizing it had been the Flicky that had hit her, she reached down and picked it up into her arms.

"Hey. Are you okay?" asked Amy. Slowly, the Flicky bird opened its eyes, then started looking around in all directions, fear obviously at the forefront of its mind. "Whoa, calm down little guy. Nothing's going to happen to you." As if to prove her wrong, a large green robot that looked like a recycle bin in appearance with big black hands rounded the corner of the sidewalk and started heading rapidly in their direction. The Flicky suddenly began squawking madly, Amy also noticing the robot heading in their direction. Getting to her feet, Amy quickly dodged out of the way as the robot nearly bowled her over.

"Hey! Watch where you're going creep!" she shouted at the robot, who instantly stopped in its tracks and turned back towards Amy and the Flicky, then started coming back towards the two of them. _Oh no! It's after us!_ she thought as she started running away from the robot, carrying the Flicky bird in her arms. Rounding the corner of the block, she quickly ducked inside the apartment complex at the corner of the block and closed the door behind her. She waited with baited breath, hoping the robot wasn't smart enough to think that she'd hide inside the building. She eyed the windows of the lobby of the complex, watching as the robot passed by without even looking inside to see if she was there.

"That must've been one of Eggman's robots, which means that ship that passed by overhead must have belonged to him," said Amy to herself as she breathed a sigh of relief at the robot's passing. She then looked down at the Flicky who had also been watching the robot leave them behind. "I'll bet that robot captured you and you escaped, didn't you?" The Flicky looked back up at her and tweeted a few times. "Well, don't worry. I'll protect you from that tin can," she said as she exited the apartment complex. "Let's go back to my place. I doubt that robot will be able to find you there."

* * *

At the same time Amy had come under attack by Eggman's robot, Sonic and Tails had reached the middle of the city, the bi-plane just beginning to finally pass by underneath the Egg Carrier. As the bi-plane cleared the Egg Carrier's shadow, Tails sent the plane into a steep climb. Sonic knelt down and gripped the wing with his right hand, holding on as the plane flew above the front of the Egg Carrier. He then looked back over his shoulder, spotting a landing strip on the front third of the top of the ship.

"Land it over there Tails!" shouted Sonic, pointing with his free hand at the runway. Tails looked back over his shoulder to see where Sonic had indicated, spotting the strip. He then returned his attention forward.

"I'm gonna have to get some distance between us and the Egg Carrier to make a proper approach!" hollered Tails to Sonic.

"Just hurry! I'm willing to bet Eggman will notice us now that we're sitting in front of him!" hollered Sonic, not taking his eyes off the airship. Almost as if on cue, the Egg Carrier suddenly slowed down considerably as they reached the edge of the city limits, almost coming to a complete stop midair, the red bi-plane suddenly shooting way ahead of the ship. Then the nose of the Egg Carrier split open, revealing a large energy focus lens resting inside of the front of the ship, energy crackling around it as it began to charge up to fire. "Uh, Tails! I think we're in trouble! Bank hard left!" shouted Sonic, his eyes going wide at what he had just seen. Without waiting to ask why, Tails threw the plane into a hard left turn. But by then, it was too late as the energy lens finished charging, letting loose with a giant blast of energy that instantly covered the distance between the airship and the bi-plane. However, Sonic's warning had saved them from being instantly fried to a crisp as instead of hitting the plane dead on, the beam blasted through the wings on the right side of the plane, sheering them off and knocking Sonic off his perch, the blue hedgehog going into a free fall towards the ground below.

"Sonic!" shouted Tails as the plane started to nose dive towards the jungle below, barrel rolling in the process, making it all but impossible for the young fox to get free of the pilot seat's belt buckle. As the plane's descent started to rapidly pick up speed, Tails wished he hadn't taken the safety precaution to strap himself in, as it was now keeping him from getting free of the doomed plane. As the plane came within five hundred meters of the tree line, Tails finally got the strap to unbuckle. Gripping the sides of the plane, Tails pulled himself free of the plane just before it hit the trees, the plane being tore apart by the branches of the trees as its body became stuck between several thick branches. But despite getting free of the plane in time to avoid being torn to shreds, Tails was unable to avoid hitting his head on one of the branches of a tree before he could even think about trying to catch himself with his ability to fly, the young fox being knocked unconscious as he fell to the ground below, coming to a rest in a heap.


End file.
